My Last Rant on Daylight Savings Time at least until spring

6:20 a.m., Monday, 8 Nov 2010 - Venus rising above the
largest tree on the horizon.

Can you tell the sky is important to us here in the flyover part of the country?  It is everywhere and we comment on it frequently.


This will be my last rant on changing time at least until spring.  Here is my initial rant.


So how are you all feeling today?  I've learned that it doesn't matter if we fall back one hour or spring forward an hour, it takes at least a week to adjust.  And to those of you with babies and young children, I know it's especially rough on you and them.  


My normal wake-up time is 5 a.m.  I was awake at 4 a.m.  My eyes are hard to keep open after 9 p.m. -- now they are trying to shut by 8 p.m.  I tell you, I'm a barrel of laughs!


I heard a story the other day on NPR's Saturday Weekend Edition with Scott Simon about Great Britain's discussing perhaps leaping forward two hours in the summer and falling back one hour -- here's the link to the story --  Time change and Great Britain -- and the person interviewed gave the same ridiculous reasons that were given to the American public about why messing with the clock is so wonderful.  It isn't wonderful.  If anything can throw a population off kilter, it's messing with the clock.


Here's another story that NPR did in 2005 about the history of the time change. NPR story on daylight savings time   It's enlightening and interesting as all things are on NPR, but I still don't like time changes.


So, I think that does it.  No more ranting about time change.  I shall move on to something else.  Thank you.

OF GARDEN SPIDERS, BUTTERNUT SQUASH AND A SINGLE PAYER HEALTH CARE SYSTEM

Hanging out laundry this morning, I faced into a cool wind blowing from the north.  A cold front is moving in. Summer 2010 is truly over. The hummingbird feeders came down this morning; I always keep them up until the last moment just in case a straggler hums in from the north on its way south.  My husband is harvesting the last of the green peppers and butternut squash. The garden spider has even come down from her magnificent web on Summersgaze and is now crouching on the southeast side of a paint chipped Adirondack chair. Summer does come to an end.


The 1 minute piece posted above is composed of shots taken from 5:15 a.m. (feeding the cats time) to 8:15 a.m. today.

* * * * * * * *

This morning I heard an interesting piece on NPR.    It was about a company in Needham, Massachusetts -- Vita Needle Company -- that hires people over the age of 65 to work.  One woman who was interviewed is over 98 years old.  It's an excellent piece -- the link is here:  NPR story


This piece, however, inadvertently pointed out the need for a single payer health care system in the United States.  Caitrin Lynch is quoted as saying that in addition to appreciating flexible hours, senior citizens bring along their own health care -- Medicare -- so the company does not have to provide health care benefits.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if all that companies had to worry about were creating  jobs for people, making a profit, and providing excellent retirement packages for their employees?  Under a single payer health care system, that could happen.  As it stands now, we are at the mercy of a health care insurance octopus with companies footing the health care expense burden when health care should be a benefit of being a citizen of the United States.  A life enhancement, if you will.


Single payer health care system.  That's the way to go. And, yes, it is that simple.

Suggestion for NPR

After all this time, I would still rather hear Bob Edwards give me the latest bad news.  Rene and Steve certainly are competent and bring their own talents to the table.  That being said, I know I need to move on.  Everyone else has.  


My suggestion is this: since there is an NPR East and an NPR West, why can't there be an NPR Flyover?  Maybe Chicago or Dallas?  I realize NPR needs to be in a city, but it would be wonderful to have an NPR anchor station in the middle of the country.  Maybe when the economy improves?  


Life happens in the flyover part of the nation too.  Just a thought.