Daylight Savings Time.

Thursday morning I woke up and discovered someone had painted my lawn white.  It happened while I slept and not only that, the vandals had painted the sidewalks the same color.  No way could a guy tell where one ended and the other started.  Shameful at best, but at least they didn't bother with the street.  It was still in place and maintained it's wonderful standard black color.  At least that part of my morning world made some sense.

Good thing it did make sense 'cause all that black reminded me I really needed that first cup of coffee in the morning before my sleep dulled brain is capable of producing a complete, rational thought.  Drug addict?  You bet - I need that caffeine every day.  So I flipped the "ON" switch so the red part of it showed and waited till the pot quit making gurgling noises. 

That's all I have to do in the morning to make coffee 'cause I get the pot ready the night before.  I've learned, after 67 years, that I'm completely unreliable in the morning.  If I attempt to make coffee at that time of day I'm asking for trouble.  It usually requires two attempts.  The first try will fail because of some silly thing like forgetting to put the coffee in the place where the water runs through it.  You know, that little basket thingy?

After a few minutes the pot settled down and stopped making more noise than I ever need to hear in the morning and I poured a hot steaming cup of Yuban.  I read the comics section of yesterdays newspaper while I drank the liquid.  By the time it was gone and the comics were finished, I felt pretty good.  Then I took another look out the window.

The hour I had spent in the kitchen trying to wake up was all it took to put everything right.  The lawn was green - had I just been dreaming of vandals when I first stumbled in?  I noticed I still could catch the local morning weather so the TV was turned on and tuned to the local station.  Sure enough, after maybe four minutes of commercials, there was young Ben B. telling me about the day ahead.

But first he eased my mind.  He told me it had snowed overnight.  Just a dusting, but real snow on the 3rd of November, which is about three or four weeks earlier than normal.  Thanks Goodness.  There was an explanation for my earlier hallucinations that made sense.  It's too bad, but I guess I'm not loony and still belong among the other sane folks in this neighborhood. 

I 'spose that's good news - but I had already started to figure out how to spend the money that comes along with being insane.  I'm sure someone will give you a check every month if you can prove that condition to them.  And I bet it's a good sized one at that.  I'm sure it's much larger than the measly Social Security check I now receive.  Crazy people need more money - they can't be expected to manage their money wisely; they're crazy, remember?

After telling me it really did snow last night ol' Ben then told me we had just barely made it five months between snows.  Yep.  The last snow of last winter fell on the First of June.  We made it five months and two days before it fell again.  Boy am I glad I live here.  The thought of shoveling snow seven months of the year thrills me - NOT.  And I'm even happier the Chamber of Commerce advertises the fact we have three hundred days of sunshine every year.  Ha.  Guess they're out to make a buck too. 

The next thing he said also brought cheer to my old, tired and now shivering body.  He mentioned we go off daylight savings time this week end.  Just how much joy is one individual 'sposed to receive in a single weather report?  By now I'm wishing I were forty years younger.  I'd join the French Foreign Legion and spend some time in the middle of the Sahara this winter instead.

I hate it when the clocks are set back.  That's the start of winter.  It's dark by 5:30 or so, curtains are drawn against the chill air on the other side of the windows and ya can't even spy on your neighbors as they drive in from work.  Did they go shopping today?  Are those Wal*Mess bags I see them carrying in? 

All the experts claim winter starts on the 21st of December.  But all of us non-experts pretty much disagree.  When the clocks "Fall Back" is the begining of winter and the good times are over until spring.  In fact, the heater's already started making warm noises on a regular basis.

Anyway, I figured I'd suffer through it for a while til it was time to see what amusement the mail man left for us in our slot of the corner box.  When you're retired, the daily Checking Of The Mail assumes gigantic importance.  While working, I constantly received surprises.  Got them in abundance for eight hours every day.  These days most of the surprises arrive in that slot.

There was a letter in today's mail - the first one of those we've received  in a while.  Usually we get bills, statements and offers to buy all kinds of stuff at tremendous savings.  Seldom do we get actual letters.  I rushed home, opened it, and began to read to Carolyn.  It was from friends who live in Tuscon, Arizona and after several interesting paragraphs, he closed by reminding us to set our clocks back this weekend.

Then he laughed as he bragged "We don't do that here in Arizona, you know.  Our winter doesn't start for another eight weeks!"  My kinda guy.  He doesn't know it yet but I got the last laugh.  I used the letter as kindling to start the first fire of our new winter. 

Hate Daylight Savings time.  Why do we do this sort of thing to ourselves?