Speaking of Jet Lag, Part 2

We don't actually have to go anywhere to develop a national jet lag.

In the midst of cajoling our memories to backtrack and retrack our conversation, my friend S. and I found ourselves sharing a mutual sympathy for the unwanted exhaustion following that wacky tradition known as returning to Standard Time, aka Greenwich Mean +2.

(As for Daylight Saving Time -- or Daylight Shifting Time, depending on whom you ask -- we have Benjamin Franklin to thank for that.  Ben, maybe you should've stuck to writing the Almanac, dating French women and flying kites in the rain).

It never made much sense to me.  After all, if there's such a discrepancy in daylight hours between the winter and summer seasons, wouldn't it be more logical to even things out over the course of the year by extending daylight waking hours during the winter, and curtailing them over the summer?

This year's confusion started on the Sunday morning between Rosh haShana and Yom Kippur, which is when we Israelis switch back the clocks in a superfluous attempt to convince ourselves that the Yom Kippur fast is in fact shorter than it actually is.  I was unaware that my handheld digital devices knew enough to reset their own chronometers, which is why, when I got out of bed in the morning, I mistakenly assumed I had an hour and five minutes to get Elder Princeski and myself ready and out the door, instead of the five minutes actually allotted.  To her credit, she made the school bus on time.

I know there are benefits to Standard Time.  By half past five in the afternoon my kids are already clamoring for their supper, convinced that night is upon us and I have neglected to notice.  

But just try convincing my brain that this time shift thing is a good idea.  I wake up at five anyway, and start to doze by ten.  Jet lag, I say.

Keep the balance,

ALN