Daylight-Saving Time: My Cable Box And Computer Worked Better Than I DidDaylight-Saving Time: My Cable Box And Computer Worked Better Than I Did

News is trickling in that the three-week-early shift to daylight-saving time was not the disaster many feared. Perhaps it was all the advance mass almost-hysteria about the havoc it was going to cause that made everyone--from us ordinary PC and cell phone owners to senior IT managers--prepare sufficiently, but the transition seems to have gone smoothly.But in my household, our machines handled the change better (much better) than the humans did. We were supposed to meet another family for an outing at 8 a.m. Sunday. I got up at 7 a.m. (or so I thought) and roused everyone. My phone rang at the exact moment that I glanced at my cable box's time, and realized it was really 8:30. Sure enough, on the other end of the line was my friend wondering what had happened to us.

Everything else worked fine. Cell phone, computer, PDA. So it goes.

As happens every spring when daylight-saving time surprises us (well, some of us), there's the usual debate about whether it's worth it. The reason Congress gave for moving it up, of course, was saving energy. But some studies say this is just bunk. The reason? Sure, we switch lights off earlier in the evening. But what about these darker mornings? The energy we use to illuminate our homes then balances out what we save late in the day. Purely anecdotal, of course, but all the parents I talked to at school this morning when dropping off our kids said they had to switch lights on to shake their sleepy children awake.

What about you? How did your business handle the change? Any disruptions? Any missed meetings? Let us know by responding to the information blog.