Ontario to match U.S. time change

[SevenSeasJim]

Not having to turn on the lights for a hour in the evening will solve all the US energy problems (ahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaa)

Ontario to match U.S. time change

Last Updated Thu, 20 Oct 2005 14:59:46 EDT

CBC News

In a bid to stay in step with Canada's largest trading partner, Ontario said Thursday it will become the first province to extend daylight time.

Attorney General Michael Bryant says the province's economy was the deciding factor and that if Ontario isn't on the same time as the United States, it will be hurt financially.

Earlier this week, reports suggested Quebec was also planning to extend daylight time.

Daylight time is now from the beginning of April to the end of October.

Under the U.S. plan, clocks will change on the second Sunday in March and the first Sunday in November, starting in 2007.

U.S. President George W. Bush signed on to the change in August as part of a massive energy bill.

Edited October 20, 2005 by Guest

[Steve from Cleveland]

I read an article in my local paper today about these guys who have been working on an engine which somehow is run by the expansion of everyone's favourite gas, Nitrous Oxide!!! I can just see it now, people huffing others' fuel... Anyhow, I'll see if I can find a link to the article somewhere. If it's not too long, maybe I'll re-type it...

Steve

[bradm]

Was it maybe someone who's using nitrous oxide in a regular gasoline engine? A lot of drag racers rig their engines to inject nitrous oxide for a quick power boost, but it's really an additive, not the fuel itself (which is still gasoline).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nitrous_oxide

Aloha,

Brad

[bouche]

quebec came up with the idea to follow the US first. woooopety doo!

[Steve from Cleveland]

BradM,

No, this was not a nitrous injection system to boost engine performace for a short amount of time. This talked of actually pusshing the pistons up and down using the expansion properties of Nitrous at relatively low temperatures and the ease of compressing it back down to the best of my recollection, without needing to store it at incredibly low temps (like hydrogen). I am familiar with race cars/drag cars using a nitrous BOOST system, and this was completely different. No fossil fuels at all... Like I said, I'll keep looking for it online, and maybe re-type it at work tomorrow...

Steve

from

Cleveland

[Vermontdave]

I've never understood the concept of day-light savings outside of the context of agriculture and farming. There's no point in this obsolete exercise anymore.

Don't do it Ontario!

peace

[bradm]

The thing I've always thought is that, if you wanted an extra hour of daylight (for example, in the winter), wouldn't you want it in the evening, when most people go out and do things? The only out-and-aboutness that occurs in the mornings is going to work, which doesn't need daylight as much as, say, after-school (or after-work) things like baseball games, cycling, or other extra-curricular activities. It seems doubly punishing to bring on the darkness an hour earlier in the fall, when it's getting dark earlier anyway.

Aloha,

Brad

[Esau]

I've never understood the concept of day-light savings outside of the context of agriculture and farming. There's no point in this obsolete exercise anymore.

Don't do it Ontario!

peace

Thats how I've always looked at it.

The thing I've always thought is that, if you wanted an extra hour of daylight (for example, in the winter), wouldn't you want it in the evening, when most people go out and do things? The only out-and-aboutness that occurs in the mornings is going to work, which doesn't need daylight as much as, say, after-school (or after-work) things like baseball games, cycling, or other extra-curricular activities. It seems doubly punishing to bring on the darkness an hour earlier in the fall, when it's getting dark earlier anyway.

Aloha,

Brad

Except for those of us who work outside year round.

[bradm]

Except for those of us who work outside year round.

Too true. My apologies for the oversight.

Aloha,

Brad

[Esau]

No need to apologise my friend,I just was thinking of the winter I was working 150ft up the hydro towers in january with a 5:30am start,and how I wished it was a bit ligther out,not that I'm scared of heights or anything but I sorta like being able to see clearly when up there,especially after a late night at the bar.

Not that an hour makes alot of difference mind you,but still every little bit is an asset

[timouse]

i remember hearing about the chaos that will be caused by all manner of common household items with embedded software that automatically compensates for daylight savings time (VCR's, electronic organizers, etc). i know that windoze always seems to tell me when we get to daylight savings, but i can't remember whether or not it does that based on what i tell it at setup.

No need to apologise my friend,I just was thinking of the winter I was working 150ft up the hydro towers in january with a 5:30am start,and how I wished it was a bit ligther out,not that I'm scared of heights or anything but I sorta like being able to see clearly when up there,especially after a late night at the bar.

Not that an hour makes alot of difference mind you,but still every little bit is an asset.

best reason yet for having the extra hour in the morning. there's nothing worse than going to work in the dark...except working in the dark

[Velvet]

This makes me sick.

[Birdy]

The thing I've always thought is that, if you wanted an extra hour of daylight (for example, in the winter), wouldn't you want it in the evening, when most people go out and do things? The only out-and-aboutness that occurs in the mornings is going to work, which doesn't need daylight as much as, say, after-school (or after-work) things like baseball games, cycling, or other extra-curricular activities. It seems doubly punishing to bring on the darkness an hour earlier in the fall, when it's getting dark earlier anyway.

Aloha,

Brad

this is going to be the death of me. i'm such a sucker for seasonal affective disorder. ugh darkness. bring on the sun!

[bradm]

Back when my Dad worked in an office, he had a desk in the middle of the floor (this was in the "open office concept" days, without even cubicles), very far from a window. He hated the winter, because he'd drive to work, in the dark, work all day indoors, and then drive home, in the dark. He didn't have SAD, but I think had almost a philosophical objection to it. He used to go walk around the building a couple of times at lunch (even in winter, in Toronto), both to get some air and, more importantly, to get some light.

Aloha,

Brad

[AD]

I had that when I was in university, only the doctor called it Delayed-Sleep-Phase-Syndrome or something like that, it was related to SAD.

I lived in a basement room, and had most of my classes in windowless rooms in Loeb Building at Carleton. I didn't seem much of the sun at all that winter.

Not fun at all.

AD

[Birdy]

i couldn't imagine not seeing the sun. luckily i have a huge window which my desk faces out towards.. if not, i'd cash in. i'm prime candidate for SAD as soon as the leaves changing colour. every fall i have to plan tons of fun activities to bide my time through the winter. luckily my job entitles me to travel to sunny florida and arizona in jan/feb/mar which definitely helps.

[Snail]

There are a few of us who went to Bluevale Collegiate for high-school (Waterloo). This was a school that had no windows in the classrooms at all. The hallways went around the outside of the school and the classrooms were in the middle well lit by flourescent lighting.

I think this was some great plan to keep us students from being distracted by the "real world" outside. I think we all had some form of SAD or maybe high school just sucks no matter how you slice it.

Edited October 21, 2005 by Guest
I can't spell

[bradm]

I worked at IBM in Toronto in 1989/1990, at their big office in Don Mills (the corner of Elginton Ave., East, and Don Mills Rd.). The building was a long, narrow rectangle, with hallways running across (parallel to the short side), with offices along the hallways. The net result was the nobody, not even my boss, had a window in their office.

I was on an internship (think a 12-month co-op term), and they ended up sticking the students into a meeting room they had converted to house two of us. The meeting room was located on top of one of the foyers that stuck out along the long side of the building, and was one of about three such rooms that occupied the second floor, above the foyer.

This meant that the meeting rooms actually had windows, and our ersatz office was on the corner, and so had two windows.

My Dad, who used to work in the same neighbourhood (see my previous post in this topic about his conditions, in which he worked for about 15 years), had retired some years before this. The day we moved in to our new office, I phoned him at home.

"Hey, Dad, guess what?"

"What?"

"I've got an office with a window!"

Aloha,

Brad

[Velvet]

I used to work there too Bradm.

[Birdy]

"Hey, Dad, guess what?"

"What?"

"I've got an office with a window!"

Aloha,

Brad

did he tear up?

[bradm]

No, but he absolutely got me one day. My Dad was a programmer, and started programming about 1960*. He kept at it (ultimately rising to a job title of "Senior Systems Analyst" before he took early retirement about 1985) for about 25 years. In his later years, he used to talk about dealing with somewhat ineffective programmers, and, in particular, the traffic along Eglinton Ave. East. (ISTR hearing that the corner of Eglinton Ave. East and Don Mills Rd. was the busiest intersection in Canada.)

One day, I came home from my job, and my Dad asked how my day was. I told him about how bad the (bus) ride home was, and how one of the programmers on my team had made some, but not all, of the necessary changes I needed to get my task done.

He looked at me, and started laughing. My Mom, who was standing beside him, got wistful, and started murmuring, "I heard this. Twenty-five years ago, I heard this..."

At this point, I realized I was deep into a child's either greatest dream, or worst nightmare: turning into one, or both, of his parents...

Aloha,

Brad

* In 1963, my Dad went to get his driver's license renewed. The lady behind the counter asked him his occupation. He replied, "Programmer." "Oh, really? What radio station do you work for?"

[bradm]

I used to work there too Bradm.

Really? I find that unexpected. I started in September, 1989, and left in (late) August, 1990. (I took a year off for the internship between 3rd and 4th year of university.) Initially, we were in the older building on Don Mills Rd., and were later moved* to the newer building located just to the West of it on Eglinton Ave. Where/when were you there, and in what capacity?

Aloha,

Brad

* IBM stands for "I've Been Moved". OK, it doesn't. It stands for "Institute of Black Magic"...

[timouse]

There are a few of us who went to Bluevale Collegiate for high-school (Waterloo). This was a school that had no windows in the classrooms at all. The hallways went around the outside of the school and the classrooms were in the middle well lit by flourescent lighting.

I think this was some great plan to keep us students from being distracted by the "real world" outside. I think we all had some form of SAD or maybe high school just sucks no matter how you slice it.

hehehehe...thanks, snail. i was happily repressing that

i wonder about that, whether it was a concerted effort to get us all to pay attention. if so, joke's on them...

[Birdy]

it's an odd feeling when you realize that you truly are indeed, a product of your parents.

scary.

[bradm]

I went to Queen's University in Kingston, and was in Applied Science, specifically Mathematics & Engineering. As a result, I spent a lot of time in Jeffrey Hall, the math building. IIRC, it was six floors, but the problem was that there's a university bylaw that says that no building can be higher than Grant Hall (which was just across the street). As a result, about three floors of it were below ground. Not only were there no windows, but even when you left a class, you had to go down a hallway and up about two flights of stairs to see the sun.

Aloha,

Brad