Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat all day drinking beer.

Do we throw up our hands or do we roll up our sleeves? (hint, door #2)

I have other things to bitch about but those will have to wait.

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

I’ve spoken to my cat about this, but it doesn’t seem to do any good.

Why is it so hard for them to condemn hate?

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

Motto for the House: Flip 5 and lose none.

Republicans in disarray!

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

Republicans don’t want a speaker to lead them; they want a hostage.

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

We will not go quietly into the night; we will not vanish without a fight.

This must be what justice looks like, not vengeful, just peaceful exuberance.

Let’s bury these fuckers at the polls 2 years from now.

Give the craziest people you know everything they want and hope they don’t ask for more? Great plan.

When you’re a Republican, they let you do it.

The words do not have to be perfect.

Their freedom requires your slavery.

Prediction: the gop will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

You cannot love your country only when you win.

“Jesus paying for the sins of everyone is an insult to those who paid for their own sins.”

It is possible to do the right thing without the promise of a cookie.

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

You are here: Home / Politics / Domestic Politics / Unite Behind a Common Enemy

Unite Behind a Common Enemy

by | 193 Comments

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My husband-the-Berniac and I were just discussing ways Hillary Clinton could unite the party if Bernie doesn’t pull off a miraculous upset, and he (the mister) had a brilliant idea: Unite to face a common enemy, i.e., Daylight Saving Time.

This would transcend parties and factions, as anyone who has blearily added bottled vegetable stock to her coffee this week would attest. Madam Secretary’s speech could start off like this:

“When that three AM phone call comes, your president should have the experience, knowledge and wisdom to face any emergency. But most of all, she should be confident that it is actually three AM, not four AM or two AM. As Americans, I don’t think this is too much to ask!”

Enough with this DST bullshit. Who’s with me?

Open thread!

Reader Interactions

193Comments

  1. 1.

    raven

    I can’t believe you didn’t like my Waiting for Guffman clip in regard to your conestoga comment!

  2. 2.

    Mnemosyne

    My cats adapted to DST faster than I did. It’s a little creepy. Of course, I don’t get a food signal when it’s time to change like they do.

  3. 3.

    Mike J

    I like the fact that in the summer time people can get off work at 5pm and still go outside and play until almost 9pm. No way do I want to cut an hour off Tuesday night sailing races.

  5. 5.

    kc

    Wait, why would you add vegetable stock to coffee?

    ETA: Duh, I get it. I blame DST for making me slower than usual.

  6. 6.

    pacem appellant

    I want CA to opt out of DST. And I want congress to allow states to be permanently on DST. After that happens, we should move permanently to DST. When I retire (in eleventy billion years) the clocks in my castle will never change from PDT. But even PST is preferable to switching back and forth twice a year. It’s bad on me and I’m an adult, but for my young school-age children, it’s awful!

  9. 9.

    pacem appellant

    @kc: At least she got her coffee. I poured the hot water into the pot, but there were no grounds in it! (It’s hard to make coffee before coffee, especially while missing an hour of sleep)

  12. 12.

    different-church-lady

    I will commit voter fraud for anyone who makes that part of the platform.

  14. 14.

    SomeOtherNathan

    There is no hotter take than being anti-DST. Have we run out of things to complain about?

  16. 16.

    MazeDancer

    Daylight Savings is destructive and misery inducing. Studies have shown how much it costs in productivity and how it does not save in energy costs. And now it’s most of the year. And kids have to get up and go to school in the dark.

    But so many people love it and think having cook-outs at 9:30 PM sunsets is so much fun, it would be hard to erase. But, oh, so wish it could be stopped.

  17. 17.

    Ultraviolet Thunder

    Don’t care personally. I work whatever schedule I need to and hop time zones constantly.
    But if there’s one thing we can all agree to hate it’s messing with the clock.
    I’m supposed to work a 12 hour day way north of Toronto Sunday then put in a 12 hour Monday in Indianapolis (525 miles away).

  19. 19.

    PhoenixRising

    @Mary G: I can’t figure out what to do with anyone who doesn’t loathe DST with the fire of 10,000 suns. So, thanks but no thanks.

    Betty, brilliant idea. Where do I sign?

    You probably already posted the link to the petition but since I’m asleep at my desk due to the time shift, I missed it.

  21. 21.

    JPL

    @squid696: just no.. I like waking to sunshine. If Hillary won’t do it, Baud will. DST is a scam to convince people to shop late.

  23. 23.

    Ultraviolet Thunder

    When we fell back last year I was over the Atlantic headed home on an A330. THAT made my timesheet interesting because it was paid travel time.

  25. 25.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @raven: Yeah, that’s the thing about “studies”. Unless they go in without an outcome in mind (and Standard vs. Daylight always operate in that mode) they’re suspect.

  31. 31.

    swiftfox

    I want to respond to the previous post about voting for the Green Party. As a wildlife biologist, it’s how I roll. Barry Commoner in 1980. If the Greens don’t have a candidate, I’ll vote D.

  32. 32.

    Kropadope

    DST doesn’t make a whole lot of sense in an era with ubiquitous light emitting devices.

  33. 33.

    Juju

    If people want DST so they can have an extra hour of daylight during the summer, why not just do it from beginning of June until the middle to end of October? As a teacher, that would work well for me.

  37. 37.

    PhoenixRising

    If we can’t all agree on that, maybe she could unite the party by calling attention to the real enemy: Shouted xenophobia. 3 parents died in front of their children last week, shot by a nut whose precipitating incident was one of the fathers speaking Spanish to his teenage son in the stairway of their apartment building.

    What I’d like a national candidate to say is: Using language that insults immigrants, threatening immigrants, leads to this. Our country has some armed individuals who aren’t wrapped too tight, and if they hear that the immigrants are a threat to them enough times, some of them will take action. How many times? Well, that’s the point. Yes, this killer is nuts, but his mania didn’t lead him to collect bottle caps or make sculpture from tinfoil scraps…it led him to kill the foreigners near him. Responsible leaders don’t turn themselves into the voices in this guy’s ear.

    And if it were John Kasich, well, I’m not voting for him, but I’d think a hell of a lot better of him.

  38. 38.

    Betty Cracker

    @raven: I did not see it and have now forgotten which thread addressed that issue (thanks, DST!). Link again?

  39. 39.

    Mike J

    @Ultraviolet Thunder: Somewhere I have a college radio aircheck of a “fall back” night I was on the air and we had a bonus hour party. It was pretty awful from a professionalism standard, but I wasn’t a professional at that point. Everyone in the studio had a good time, and we got a dozen phone calls, which isn’t bad for 2am over 400 watts.

  41. 41.

    Ultraviolet Thunder

    Some captain of industry recently made a serious argument that the US should have at most three, but better only two timezones. Because business would be more efficient that way.
    Sure it would, except you’d have school kids going out to recess at dawn and people going to bed at 10:00 pm in full daylight. Absurd misalignment of activities and natural cycles. But good for business.

  44. 44.

    Renie

    i’ve noticed gasoline going up at least 10 cents in the last 2 weeks here in NYS. anyone know why?

  45. 45.

    JMG

    Sorry, Ms. Cracker, that’s easy for you Floridians to say. Here in eastern Mass. when the sun goes down between 4 and 5 p.m. from November through January, and it doesn’t really get dependably nice until June, that extra hour of light in the evening is pretty sweet.

  47. 47.

    maeve

    People like daylight savings time – they just don’t like switching. So we just make it permanent.

    Geographically I’m in the wrong time zone (and far north) – the sun rises at 4 am in the summer at sets at 10 pm – I don’t need more daylight but I do NOT want the sun to rise at 3 am. I’m okay with it rising at 9:30 am and setting at 4 pm (instead of 3 pm) in the winter. The school buses already have flashing lights on top in the winter.

  49. 49.

    ThresherK

    I promise, just one last “Lady ManNames” team in the womens’ NCAAs: The Duquesne Lady Dukes (du-KANE).

    Marist’s Red Foxes, a favorite, are not in this year. However the South Dakota State Lady Jackrabbits are ready for your rooting interest.

    (Shamelessly rerun from the downstairs thread I didn’t know was dead.)

  50. 50.

    Mingobat f/k/a Karen in GA

    My iPhone has gone back and forth a couple of times this week between the correct time and one hour behind. At least, I’ve noticed it a couple of times — no idea how many times it’s done it. Since it’s also my alarm clock, it kind of worries me.

    Otherwise, I like the extra hour of daylight in the evening.

  51. 51.

    jl

    Every person keeps their own damn time zone. Freedom. Personal responsibility. Excuses galore. I like it.

  52. 52.

    raven

    @Renie:

    The price of gasoline is going up sharply. It’s a combination of the time of year and the nice weather we’ve had.

    That means supply is down, demand is up, and that is a recipe for prices to spike. That’s exactly what you’re seeing at your local gas station.

    The national average price for a gallon of regular has gone up almost 12 cents just in the last week alone. Here in Connecticut, the increase hasn’t been quite that dramatic. The AAA says the state average price has gone up 9 cents in the last week to $1.95 a gallon. There are several things going on here.

    This is the time of year when oil refineries shut down for spring maintenance, so there is less gas being made, and that accounts for the lower demand. Plus, remember, all those nice, warm days we’ve had in the last couple weeks? You could drive around with the windows down?

    Well, a lot of other people were out enjoying that weather, too, and the Quinnipiac economics professor we talked to says that means higher demand.

    “I mean, I see it on the weekends when I go out. the malls are more crowded, the stores are more crowded, so people are getting out and about and we’re starting to get a little bit of a creep in oil prices too. Those things sort of combine and the price rises pretty quickly,” said Prof. Donn Johnson, Quinnipiac University.

    And it’s not likely to go down anytime soon. See, the government requires a more environmentally-friendly type of gasoline during the summer months to reduce smog. Unfortunately, that summer blend is also more expensive to make, so that could keep prices up for the next several months.

    Let’s keep it in perspective, though. In the past decade, we’ve seen gas prices flirt with $4 a gallon. We’re still under $2. In fact, the AAA says we are paying almost 60 cents less a gallon now than we were just one year ago.

  54. 54.

    Thor Heyerdahl

    @Ultraviolet Thunder:

    I’m supposed to work a 12 hour day way north of Toronto Sunday then put in a 12 hour Monday in Indianapolis (525 miles away).

    Sudbury, North Bay, Timmins, Kapuskasing? 525 miles driving or as the crow flies?

  55. 55.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    @maeve: the problem is it is really dark in the morning in late fall/winter.

    In my neighborhood, in December, sun rise occurs at 7:15 AM. If we kept DST, it would be 8:15 AM.

    People don’t want their kids, especially grammar school age, walking in the dark to school (no buses in my area).

  56. 56.

    Anoniminous

    Each of the 4 contiguous time zones should be sliced into north/south sections. Then each of those should be divided into heptagons and the heptagons into triangles.

    Because we can.

  57. 57.

    Ultraviolet Thunder

    @jl:

    Every person keeps their own damn time zone. Freedom. Personal responsibility. Excuses galore. I like it.

    This used to be a thing in England (and probably elsewhere). In every town noon was when the sun was highest in the sky. But in the age of railroads this played hell with schedules so time was standardized. Last I heard the only place that still used local time was Oxford, 5 minutes off London noon. Because fvk everything after the 14th century.

  58. 58.

    beltane

    I like DST. I also appreciate the need to switch to standard time in the fall (sending kids to school in the dark scares me). If Daylight Savings Time is the common enemy, I’m afraid I will be voting 3rd party.

  60. 60.

    Grumpy Code Monkey

    I prefer Daylight Savings over Standard time – I’d rather have that extra hour of daylight in the evening.

  61. 61.

    Ultraviolet Thunder

    @Thor Heyerdahl:

    Sudbury, North Bay, Timmins, Kapuskasing? 525 miles driving or as the crow flies?

    Newmarket ON to New Castle IN, pretty much overnight according to the schedule. 525 miles is a hell of a commute. I think schedule adjustments will have to be made. The interim boss isn’t working out real well so far.

  63. 63.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    Wimps.

    Try remembering that there’s nine hours difference between CET and PST, except for two weeks in the Spring and two weeks in the Fall when you have to remember that it’s only eight hours, because one of them has changed the clocks and other hasn’t yet, or vice versa.

    Remembering that it’s an hour later/earlier where you, yourself are is bad enough, but that plus the differential drives you nuts.

    So I’m on board, but only if it’s global.

  65. 65.

    Mike J

    BTW, BST starts one week from this Sunday. And then I can go back to my normal 8 hour offset.I wish the countries that switch would all do it at the same time.

  67. 67.

    Matt McIrvin

    The big problem is still factional division: everyone hates the changeover, but do we go to standard time year-round or DST year-round?

  68. 68.

    different-church-lady

    @jl: That’s exactly how it used to be: noon was whenever the sun was directly overhead wherever you happened to be.

    Damn railroads came along and took it away from us.

  70. 70.

    beltane

    Some people will not be satisfied until the Earth shifts on its axis so that the days and nights where they live are unchanging and of the desired length. If you are one of those people, Donald Trump is the candidate for you.

  71. 71.

    Thor Heyerdahl

    @Ultraviolet Thunder: Newmarket is far enough north. “Way north” was where I thought people had cottages in the summer. Hope highway 400, 401 & 402 traffic is reasonable for you.

  74. 74.

    Ultraviolet Thunder

    China has or had until recently only one time zone for the whole thousands-of-miles-wide country: Beijing time. This was supposed to coordinate activities throughout the nation. I think it was Mao’s idea or at least he’s blamed for it.
    It is ignored. Everyone just goes about their business according to the sun as they have for tens of centuries.

  75. 75.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    soxared040713 Crete, IL From Boston, MA 9 hours ago

    Mr. President, this is a superb choice. Congratulations for taking the time throughout all the sound and fury to deliberate clearly about a supremely important matter. Judge Garland should be heard by the Senate Committee on the Judiciary as soon as may be, and then his nomination should be brought to the full Senate without delay. This Senate has two choices: hewing to rigid ideology or serving the public interest. If it is to be the former, then history will be harsh and unforgiving. If it is to be the latter, America will grateful for the Senate’s having risen above partisanship to attend to the business of the commonwealth.

    650 Recommend

    DB Charlottesville, Virginia 9 hours ago

    An Inspired choice and one that he Party of “NO” should have no reason to block. Given Sen. Hatch’s comments about this man’s qualifications several years ago, I would like to see him stand up to the rest of the senate republicans and insist they first hear him in committee, bring his nomination to the floor and then confirm him. He is not right and he is not left and he is supremely qualified.

    But….. who knows what this obstructionist Senate will do. Certainly not anything that is right and honest but probably go for further obstruction.

    703 Recommend

    James New York, NY 9 hours ago

    Brilliant selection by the President. Instrumental in the Oklahoma City bombing case, a former clerk of Justice Brennan, previously endorsed by Orrin Hatch… President Obama picked the right candidate to hit the Senate Judiciary Committee’s pressure points. Game on.

    430 Recommend

    Some whiners are saying he’s not liberal enough, but he’s a Chicago Jew who worked for Brennan, a giant of liberalism. What do they want, someone with “Che” tattooed on his forehead?

  76. 76.

    Gelfling545

    So I went through the dst thing here from which I have not yet recovered, then I’ll be jet-lagged after my flight lands on Tuesday, then Saturday is France’s dst time change. Any reports of an American zombie stumbling around Paris will be referring to me.

  77. 77.

    Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism

    @debit:

    Twice a year I am the guy screaming “WHAT TIME IS IT?”

    I can’t believe no Hamiltonian has answered you.

    OK, who was it who has switched allegiances from the excellent Mr. Diggs to the also excellent Mr. Odom?

    I have a Live Q&A with bonus peep show for you.

  78. 78.

    NotMax

    Changing time only twice a year is so last century. 6 times a year, baby! Keeps people on their toes!

    Or we can go Bundytime, when every sovereign citizen gets to choose his or her own setting!

  79. 79.

    Ultraviolet Thunder

    @Thor Heyerdahl:
    I was up in Parry Sound a couple of weekends ago for work. It’s awesome in July, but in Feb just very empty and cold.
    My origin is Detroit so I may be able to break up the Newmarket-New Castle schlep into an evening drive home and a morning drive to New Castle.

  80. 80.

    Mnemosyne

    @ThresherK:

    I’m assuming they’re not the Duchesses because no one wants to change the logo. But “Lady Dukes” is especially stupid since there’s a feminine form of “Duke.”

  83. 83.

    Jack the Second

    @Mike J: You’re stealing that hour from me.

    My schedule has me going to work in the late morning and returning after nightfall, 9pm most days. Wanting a little daylight in my life, I wake up early and spend the mornings outside.

    DST means that mornings start an hour later, so I get an hour less to spend out in the sunshine each day.

  86. 86.

    Percysowner

    I don’t like DST, but I’m willing to go with pick one either one and just stick with it. I also don’t know anyone who doesn’t have strong feelings on the matter. So I vote for holding the issue until the 2020 elections (the one that will elect the state representatives that will handle redistricting after the census) and then put it on the ballot in every single state. It would push voter turn out up. Heck, people might well be willing to drop ID requirements, just to make sure they won’t have any problem making their position law.

  87. 87.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    Bette Midler had a great line about grappling with trans-Atlantic communication: “It’s easy, whatever time it is in New York, it’s 1932 in London”.

    Doesn’t really work anymore, but it was perfect at the time.

  89. 89.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Grumpy Code Monkey:

    Surely if we can send a man to the moon and find a cure for polio, we can figure out a way to have an extra hour of daylight in the morning and at night. We have the technology, this is Murka!!

  91. 91.

    Mike J

    @Jack the Second:

    DST means that mornings start an hour later, so I get an hour less to spend out in the sunshine each day.

    The sun still comes up at 4:30, and it’s much tougher to get people out for 5am races before work than for 5pm races after work.

  93. 93.

    ThresherK

    @Mnemosyne: I always wondered if there was a finishing school who gave their teams no-doubt female nicknames like that. Miss Porter’s is very close to me, actually.

  94. 94.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Bill E Pilgrim:

    You mean because “unchanging and of the desired length” perfectly describes his hair?

    Reminds me of Rmoney and his paean to Michigan “where all the trees are the right height.”

  95. 95.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    @beltane: We live in a great time zone, the best, really a tremendous, tremendous time zone, and everyone should just change to match ours.

  96. 96.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    @gogol’s wife: She is pretty (photo). I think the “libuerl” media never gave her a chance cuz they hated independent women. Plus, the DC media like Broder and Sally Quinn projected their long standing boomer hate, that been festering for 25 years, on to her.

  97. 97.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    @Bill E Pilgrim: It’s weird how backwards London was. 10 years ago, one of my class mates went to London School of Economics and he told me it was like a time warp to the 70s (except for the hair styles and bell bottoms).

  99. 99.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    @SiubhanDuinne: I had to look that up, my god he actually said that. It reminds me of Scooter Libby a little bit. Someone should put out a book of experimental poetry by conservative Republicans. Accidentally experimental, in fact accidentally poetry.

  101. 101.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Ultraviolet Thunder:

    I was up in Parry Sound a couple of weekends ago for work. It’s awesome in July, but in Feb just very empty and cold.

    That’s very close to the part of Ontario I know best (Owen Sound). I do love it in the summertime, but would have to make some major mental adjustments to live there in the winter (which I’m actually considering doing). Happily, I’m pretty good at hibernating.

  102. 102.

    namekarB

    There is another big problem that needs fixing that everyone would get behind. Outlaw all unsolicited phone calls including non-profit and pollsters. I’m serious. I would support a candidate who would advocate to make it illegal to call my cell phone trying to solicit me for anything, including donations or poll questions.

  103. 103.

    Mnemosyne

    @Bill E Pilgrim:

    By the way, Mr. Aaron Burr fan ;-) — the other defense of Hamilton is that Burr gets the two best songs in the show. “Wait For It”, sung by Musicality, the Curie High School vocal ensemble.

    (Obviously, the original solos are sung solely by the Burr character.)

    Join our cult. We have cookies!

  105. 105.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    @David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch: Definitely. London seemed so old fashioned not that long ago, and still does in many ways, yet now with the architecture and etc it feels more modern than most of the US, in some aspects.

    David Lodge describes the difference well in one of his novels, I think Changing Places, the parts about the UK with the description for instance of the guy’s father who wouldn’t upgrade to central heating because “it’s bad for the furniture” so he cloistered himself in the kitchen all winter in front of the coal fire.

  108. 108.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    @Mnemosyne: Oh well as I said I’ll have to see it. “The other” defense makes me think I missed a reply, I don’t remember seeing any in fact, I was only on for a moment earlier. (That’s okay, I prefer that sometimes, not looking back for replies. Threads get worse the longer they go on, in my experience).

    It’s not that I’m a fan, it was really just a tremendous, tremendous, er a really good book, very eye-opening, certainly upended everything I had heard. I just hate lazy common wisdom. I read something very glancing about the show just going with the old image, wasn’t a condemnation of the show as a whole since as I say, haven’t seen it. But plan to.

  109. 109.

    Amir Khalid

    @Mnemosyne:
    It could be worse. I seem to remember a pop singer — was she the woman member of the Black Eyed Peas? — who spelled it “Dutchess”, with a T.

  110. 110.

    the Conster, la Citoyenne

    I hope that Berniacs have learned that AA votes not only count, they count the most if you’re after delegates because they’re the most reliable voters, even after being sold out over and over. If only Bernie had paid more attention to what Obama did to beat the Clinton Machine. But no, nothing to learn from the master apparently. Children’s crusades never ever work.

    ETA: Get rid of DST, legalize pot, and drop the retirement age to 62. Win win win

  117. 117.

    Mike J

    @Bill E Pilgrim:

    father who wouldn’t upgrade to central heating because “it’s bad for the furniture” so he cloistered himself in the kitchen all winter in front of the coal fire.

    I thought that was why people had Aga cookers. They’re on all the time.

  121. 121.

    Mike J

    @Eric U.:

    Carter had year-round DST, and it was great. Shift school starting times

    During The War (caps so you don’t have to ask which one) they had war time and double war time.

  123. 123.

    Mnemosyne

    @Bill E Pilgrim:

    Most of what I’ve heard about the Isenberg book is that she steps a little too far into hagiography and ends up demonizing everyone else. One of the things I liked about Chernow’s book on Hamilton was that he clearly liked and admired the guy, but he didn’t make any excuses for his mistakes. In fact, there were a couple of spots where I felt like Chernow would have loved to borrow a time machine and go slap some sense into Hamilton. Isenberg ended up repeating a lot of the conventional wisdom about Hamilton in the name of “balance.”

    If you have Amazon Prime Music, you can stream the cast album for free. It’s definitely worth it.

  124. 124.

    I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet

    @SiubhanDuinne: The work week should be 6 hours/day, 4 days a week.

    For the same weekly pay.

    Who’s with me?!?!

    Cheers,
    Scott.
    (Who is only half-kidding.)

  129. 129.

    MomSense

    So conflicted. The adjustment is terrible but I can hike for an hour after work in the woods with the dog and see where I’m walking.

  131. 131.

    Iowa Old Lady

    @Bill E Pilgrim: I love that book! My favorite part is when the Brit guy proposes a game called Humiliation in which you get points for naming something you haven’t read and counting the number of player who have. At first the competitive young American academic doesn’t get it, so he names some obscure thing that no one else has read and gets no points. Then he’s torn. Finally his urge to win triumphs so he claims he’s never read Hamlet and gets tons of points, but he happens to be up for tenure and it’s denied because, good lord, the man has never read Hamlet.

  132. 132.

    ThresherK

    @Thor Heyerdahl: “Possum Lodge” from The Red Green Show was, by lore, about 150 beer stores north of Toronto.

    Never having been due north from Toronto, I have no idea what that is in miles or km.

  134. 134.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    Okay so this is making me think of possibly the most well-known French tongue-twister, the equivalent of Peter Piper basically, which goes like this:

    Les chaussettes de l’archiduchesse sont-elles sèches ou archi-sèches ?

  136. 136.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Amir Khalid:

    There’s a county in NY State (Poughkeepsie-Hudson Valley) called Dutchess County. They spell it with the “T.” It has always looked wrong to me; just looking at the name makes me all itchy.

  137. 137.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    @Iowa Old Lady: Wow I’d forgotten that part. Wonderful stuff, the whole trilogy — I couldn’t remember the names but just looked it up on his author page: Changing Places, Small World, and Nice Work.

    One of the more fun parts is that Morris Zapp is Stanley Fish. When Fish had a column for a while in the NYT recently, every time I read one I’d end up slapping my forehead. Well satirized by Lodge.

  138. 138.

    sinnedbackwards

    As much as disagreeing with the esteemed Ms. Cracker pains me, I will fight to the dearth to defend later sunset. It is Coyote’s way.

  141. 141.

    jl

    @different-church-lady:

    ” Damn railroads came along and took it away from us. ”

    Not in Freedom United States, don’t blame the railroads. We had lots of little local times and the railroads had to keep track of them all.

    And, little intertube search indicates it was the damn Brits who got totalitarian with the time, around 1840. The US had Freedom Time until 1883. Partly instigated by some Canadian, which makes the whole deal suspicious, you ask me.

    First there was standard time
    http://www.webexhibits.org/daylightsaving/d.html

  143. 143.

    Mike J

    @Mnemosyne:

    I’m assuming they’re not the Duchesses because no one wants to change the logo. But “Lady Dukes” is especially stupid since there’s a feminine form of “Duke.”

    I solved this problem the other day. Make the mascot a great dane and call the team the Mama Dukes.

  144. 144.

    Baud

    @jl:

    Partly instigated by some Canadian, which makes the whole deal suspicious, you ask me.

    First time zones, now Cruz. What does Canada hate us so?

  145. 145.

    jl

    @Baud:

    ” I’d like to take it slow, so just time. ”

    FU Baud! 2016!
    You claimed you were a virtual timeless candidate.

    That is a Baud! FLOPS-FLOPS, and probably end whatever pathetic remnant of your campaign still in existence.

    I trusted Baud! 2016! to save the nation, but have been betrayed.

  146. 146.

    Iowa Old Lady

    I also like the moment in Small World where the obscure Australian academic gets to the big conference still not having been able to write the end of his paper and he gets to the part where he has to read it, and he’s saved because Zapp has a heart attack in the audience. It’s like that nightmare where you haven’t prepared for the test.

  147. 147.

    jl

    @Baud: The Southpark prophecy of a great righteous and holy Canadian war will come. Trust me.

    Edit: Or is it Canadia? Maybe I’ve been listening to too many GOP debates. They are over my head, being modeled on Ancient Grecian wisdom and civics.

  149. 149.

    Baud

    @jl:

    You claimed you were a virtual timeless candidate.

    I am timeless. You can’t change a corrupt system by taking its time.

  150. 150.

    jl

    @Baud: Gibberish works in the GOP primary. You picked the wrong party, that has always been the big problem of your campaign.

  151. 151.

    Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism

    @MomSense: Then you definitely need to see that video.

    @Amir Khalid: A Dutchess is a Nederlandse. New York was originally New Amsterdam, and most of the prominent families at the time of the Revolution were descendants of the early Dutch landownders, the Schuyler family Hamilton married into being one example.

  152. 152.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    @Mike J:

    I like it.

    BTW for anyone wondering the translation would be roughly:

    The Archduchess’s socks, are they dry, or super-dry?

    Doesn’t work at all in English of course as a twister but that would be the best translation I think. “Archi” is like “arch” as in “arch enemy”, but we’d say “super” or “extra-dry” in a case like that I think.

    The weird part about tongue twisters is that they trip you up a lot less if it’s not your language, i.e. your native tongue. I sort of understand why but it would be hard to put into words.

  153. 153.

    pseudonymous in nc

    @MazeDancer:

    And kids have to get up and go to school in the dark.

    Well, that’s because school hours in America are ridiculous and based on the idea that kids were needed to work in the fields, even though all studies now show that a later start to the school day improves educational performance. It has nothing to do with fucking Daylight Savings.

  155. 155.

    Feathers

    I was working in the conference room today, putting some stuff together. Thought I was being insanely productive. When I went out into the main office, realized that it was just that no one had changed the clock in the conference room. Went back in with some co-workers, confirmed that the clock was wrong. Looked at it, it was decorative, no glass covering it, no visible winder, so I reached up and pushed the minutes had until it had the correct time.

    The youngins’ looked at me like it had just performed MAGIC.

    Oh, yeah, Fuck DST!

  156. 156.

    John W.

    Oh, Mrs. C I’m with you! DST is a bane in my otherwise quite nice life! I hate DST with the fury of a thousand suns.

  157. 157.

    NotMax

    Time is too slow for those who wait
    And time is too swift for those that fear
    Time is too long for those that grieve
    And time is too short for those that laugh.

    >It’s A Beautiful Day

    Can’t quite believe forgot about linking that on this thread until just this moment.

  158. 158.

    Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism

    @pseudonymous in nc: Eh, that’s less of a factor than bus schedules these days. Have to stagger the start of the school day so you don’t have to buy enough buses to carry all the kids at the same time.

  160. 160.

    Renie

    @raven: thanks for the info; didn’t know any of that. writer is correct that gas prices are still very low

    the gas station i use changes prices on thursdays, have noticed he’s been changing them more often lately

  161. 161.

    NotMax

    My husband-the-Berniac

    Perhaps the worst of the proposed spin-off series to My Mother the Car*.

    ;)

    *(Yes, young’uns, that really was a network show.)

  165. 165.

    satby

    Well, I admit I like DST and it’s not a hassle for me to adapt to. I like the late, late sunsets in summer. Both of my exchange daughters are already complaining that it will be a long day for the Ramadan fast though.

  166. 166.

    redshirt

    Up here in the land of ice and snow, the sun sets at 3:45 in December. It’s brutal. I’d take 4:45 any day. So give me DST or give me SAD.

  167. 167.

    PurpleGirl

    Twice a year for many, many years I’ve heard people complain about changing the time. I do not understand what the problem is. I’ve never had a hard time with the time change. And this year since was a awake all night I had no problems either. Maybe it’s because I see time as relative and a human construct. We decided that sun in a certain position meant something as a marker of “time”.

  168. 168.

    redshirt

    It must be so nice to live at the Equator. 6 AM sunrise, 6PM sunset, every day of the year. Something you can count on. Also, the stars move properly from East to West.

  169. 169.

    Andrew

    Living in a country that doesn’t have Day light savings, I have to say how much is totally sucks to have the sun come up at 4am and the sky starting to lighten at 3.30am, at the height of summer. I miss daylight savings with a passion!

  170. 170.

    namekarB

    Arizona does not have DST. The problem for us railroaders was that California and New Mexico did have DST so the railroads used DST in Arizona even though the state did not. In Tucson when asked what was the time, the railroader standard reply was “City time or railroad time?”

  173. 173.

    Prescott Cactus

    Arizona, where you never, ever have to change your clocks, but some Jackhole can take an AK-47 into the grocery store.

    Life is full of tradeoffs.

  174. 174.

    pseudonymous in nc

    @satby:

    I think parts of Indiana used to be that way too, some of the state on DST and other parts not.

    Indiana time is an infamous clusterfuck, because you have metro-Louisville bits (that want to be in ET) and metro-Chicago bits (that want to be in CT), and yeah, for a while, they decided to complicate that with DST or no-DST.

  177. 177.

    CaseyL

    Isn’t one of Canada’s provinces off from everyone else on the coast by half an hour? Newfoundland, I think? I’ve never understood that: what, they’re half a time zone away?

    I love DST because I, too, love those long summer days when it’s light until 10:00 pm. I also get a kick out of the end of DST, when time reverses itself and I get a free hour. Cosmic!

  178. 178.

    RaflW

    Enough with this DST bullshit. Who’s with me?

    I am firmly against you. After spending most of the Minnesota winter in the fvking dark, DST allows us to actually enjoy spring outside, after work, in freaking daylight, not under orange sodium lights or them newfangled overbright led street lamps.

    Now, I would make a deal with you: No DST if we can just stay leapt forward one hour, year round. That, I’d do.

  179. 179.

    PurpleGirl

    @I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet: Hey, I distinctly remember people saying that sometime in the future that would happen and it would mean more people would be needed to make up the work. Nah, what happened was computers changed work routines and the numbers of people needed and companies cut back instead and found ways to pay less for more work.

  180. 180.

    PurpleGirl

    @SiubhanDuinne: That’s because some of the original settlers were DUTCH, as in from Holland/the Netherlands. IIRC the Roosevelts were a Dutch family, the name with the double oo carries a long sound like roo, not a short o as in rose.

    ETA: One of the major cities in the county is Rhinebeck, which is close to the Dutchess County Fairgrounds.

  182. 182.

    mclaren

    My husband-the-Berniac and I were just discussing ways Hillary Clinton could unite the party if Bernie doesn’t pull off a miraculous upset…

    Well, that seems obvious!

    Hillary can unite the party by:

    [1] Giving another speech to billionaire Wall Streeters explaining that “bashing the bankers is not productive” and “it needs to stop.”

    [2] Propose bombing and invading another third-world country. (Always popular no matter what party or what year!)

    [3] Explaining that she favors raising the minimum wage but objects to passing a federal law to do it. (Which is different from doing nothing because…uh…wait…um, okay, never mind.)

    [4] Telling us that the key to middle class prosperity is better education and more training. So a lot of better-educated people can play musical chairs competing for the same shrinking number of jobs.

    [5] Talking about women’s issues. Always a great way to divert the conversation. Poverty? “Think of the single women!” War? “Think of the war widows!” Corruption? “Think of the impoverished women with children!” Global warming? “Think of the young girls who won’t be able to get abortions!”

    [6] Explaining how great the economy is doing. She can record a few speeches on the subject while her private jet is flying her to Davos.

    [7] Discussing the deep importance of family. She’ll have to avoid the shots of her husband getting blowjobs in the background, but, hey, we have digital editing suites now.

  185. 185.

    mclaren

    @PurpleGirl:

    Twice a year for many, many years I’ve heard people complain about changing the time. I do not understand what the problem is. I’ve never had a hard time with the time change.

    Spoken like someone who doesn’t sleep in a coffin. The effete snobbery of these mundanes!

  186. 186.

    mclaren

    @beltane:

    Some people will not be satisfied until the Earth shifts on its axis so that the days and nights where they live are unchanging and of the desired length. If you are one of those people, Donald Trump is the candidate for you.

    Hey! It will be a YUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGE shift. Very classy. And Mexico will pay for it.

  187. 187.

    JustRuss

    Here’s my proposal:

    DST: Gone
    Time zones: Gone
    Put the whole world–we’re America dammit, we can do this!– on GMT. Boom, no more ambiguity about what friggin time zone we’re talking about…I’m looking at you, Outlook calendar!
    Each state gets to decide when its business day starts. Businesses can cue off of that or do whatever the hell they want. After a little chaos, they’ll figure it out.

    Yes, there will be much wailing and gnashing of teeth. And after a couple years people will be talking about how insane our system of timekeeping used to be.

  189. 189.

    Tehanu

    @Mary G:

    Also not a morning person. I love Daylight Time — it’s the change that’s a pain in the butt. If they would just move the clocks back a half hour and LEAVE IT THERE, I’d be happy.

  191. 191.

    What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?

    I’d support the idea of permanently abolishing Standard time in favor of DST because I don’t give a crap about early morning light (and I get up at 6:00 AM most mornings) but would love an extra hour of light in the evening even in the middle of winter. I could see why people further south may not like this idea but that’s the direction I’d go to avoid a time change twice a year.

  192. 192.

    ron

    abolish 1 and the sun comes up as early as 4:30. abolish the other and it sets as early as 3:30. think things through.

  193. 193.

    Eric

    Better yet, get rid of Standard Time. There’s no reason to leave work at 5 under the cover of nightfall, winter or no.

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