Daylight saving
I should like to comment on John Nelson’s letter about daylight saving (The Timaru Herald, April 10).
While I know that it has its merits especially for working people, daylight saving has its drawbacks too.
It is hard to get children to bed at an early hour at night with the sun streaming into their bedrooms, and I don’t think that it is a discipline problem. No-one wants to go to sleep in a hot stuffy room. I wouldn’t.
Another thing that I miss due to daylight saving is the Christmas lights. One has to stay up until all hours to see them, and I often don’t so I miss out, and I really miss them.
Also it is too cold for outdoor activity in October when daylight saving starts. The same happens in March, it gets dark naturally at that time of the year.
So if we have to have it, how about going back to having it from Labour Weekend until say the first or second weekend in March then those who work during the day could enjoy it. In my view it goes on for too long. Maureen Harper Timaru
The recent song and dance about the pros and cons of the daylight saving time change amused but did not inform.
Every year farmers complain that their animals become distressed, milk and egg production being affected. Some people comment that the extra sun blisters the paint on their houses.
This nonsense is unfair to the memory of one of the founders of daylight saving, Alfred Larkman, whose actual concept has been heavily modified.
Larkman, chief engineer on Ernest Shackleton’s support ship Aurora, was my form master at Wanganui Tech. A lovely fellow, with brilliance ahead of his time, he suggested local sunrise worldwide should always be at 7am.
With modern technology this can now be readily achieved. A single rolling time zone is only a minor adjustment to what now causes so much upset. No more ‘‘spring forward, fall back’’.
In time humanity will not even notice the automatic undulating adjustments to its timepieces. Relics such as Big Ben will become objects of amusement and wonder. Old Faithful in Yellowstone may have to be renamed. (It needed winding when we were there!)
And those of us with multiple watches presently set an hour apart will abandon them for a clever device designed and manufactured to mimic solar time. Modern life is just so complex. Clive Shaw Timaru