Adios, Daylight Saving Time.....and Good Riddance.

In a few days, my friends in the U.S. will be "falling back", as they say - setting their clocks back one hour to end daylight saving time for 2014. If there is one thing I will not miss about living in the U.S., it is their idiotic clock changing stunt twice a year.

Here in Philippines, the folks leave their clocks be; there's no "spring forward - fall back". I have never liked daylight saving time and I'm so happy not to have to deal with it ever again.

There's never been any call for it here; the sun rises and sets at pretty close to the same time all year long. It isn't exact, of course. There is a slight variation, but I want to put emphasis on the word "slight". We're too close to the equator for there to be much variation through out the year.

The whole concept of DST is an illusion, anyway.

Some fools in the U.S. actually believe that it's the turning forward of the clock in Spring that gives them more "daylight" hours in the Summer. They have not idea that it's the tilt of the planet which is responsible for the increase. Moving the clock forward doesn't make the daylight longer......it only adjusts this artificial "clock" that they're programed to follow.

Before starting on this post, I Googled "daylight saving time" and came across an article with the headline, "Daylight Saving Time changes could be a thing of the past in Alabama if legislator gets his way".

I thought I was going to read about a legislator having a bit of common sense. I should have known better, seeing how this legislator comes from Alabama.

Rather than end daylight saving time, by leaving Alabama on standard time all year, this guy wants to keep Alabama on daylight saving time forever.

Alabama state Sen. Rusty Glover said in a release, "Our legislation will make sure that children riding the late afternoon school bus, or working people who get off at 5 o'clock, won't have to come home in the dark."

He doesn't seem to understand that by using DST, the folks who "get off at 5 o'clock" are actually getting off at four. He could accomplish the same thing, by leaving the clocks on standard time and getting the schools and businesses to actually change the time everyone goes home. Just have the people who get off at 5, get off at 4. They're doing that in the Summer as it is. They just don't seem to know it.

Game Seven.

About a week ago, I saw someone from the cable company, ladder up against the pole, doing some work on the cable.

A day later, we noticed that additional channels had been added to our cable package; as a matter of fact, we were now getting all the channels available from the cable company, including several Chinese language channels,  along a few  kids' stations and a number of English language news and sports networks.

 One of the new channels was I getting was Fox Sports. I found that station about the seventh inning of game 5 of the World Series. That was Monday morning, Philippine time. Game six would be on Wednesday morning in Philippines and I was really looking forward to watching the game.

Unfortunately, after getting set to watch the game, I lost the free channels. I don't know exactly what happened. I don't know why I had the stations for a few days or why the stations were no longer free.

 As it happened, I had to listen to game six on the radio via the Internet. That would have been a good one to watch. Now, I'm listening to game seven over the ESPN Radio website. Radio is OK, but it ain't TV.

 Next time I pay the cable bill, I'll check on getting Fox Sports, Fox News, BBC World news and Al Jazeera added to our package. If I'm right, it'll cost an additional 500 peso on our monthly bill. That's a little over $10 US. I guess I can handle that.

World Changing? Yes. New? Not So Much.

From the BBC Future WORLD-CHANGING IDEAS SUMMIT website, we have this:

"On October 21, BBC FUTURE will present the first-ever WORLD-CHANGING IDEAS SUMMIT, which will showcase the power of bringing forward-thinking leaders together to build a better tomorrow."

Really?

Right off hand I'd say that the folks who bring us the TED conferences might argue that the BBC's WORLD-CHANGING IDEAS SUMMIT, may not be the first-ever.

Be that as it may, let's look at a few of the ideas which will be put forward by these "forward-thinking leaders".

Some of the topics which the event's "diverse community" will discuss include:

"Why We Need to Live On Other Planets"
"Why Everyone Needs a Drone"
"Robots Everywhere! Can’t Live with Them, Can’t Kill Them"
to list just three.

And let's not forget Rahm's older brother, Ezekiel J. Emanuel's topic, "Just Because We Can Live Longer Doesn't Mean We Should".

If you want to get up to speed on Emanuel's idea, you can read his recent article in The Atlantic, Why I Hope to Die at 75.

Unlike novelist Martin Amis, who advocates euthanasia booths for the elderly, Emanuel maintains that he is against euthanasia and says that he will not engage in euthanasia or suicide, but that he will simply give up any medical treatments after the age of 75.

He said, "I won’t actively end my life. But I won’t try to prolong it, either."

For Emanuel, "This means colonoscopies and other cancer-screening tests are out—and before 75",
and -
"After 75, if I develop cancer, I will refuse treatment. Similarly, no cardiac stress test. No pacemaker and certainly no implantable defibrillator. No heart-valve replacement or bypass surgery. If I develop emphysema or some similar disease that involves frequent exacerbations that would, normally, land me in the hospital, I will accept treatment to ameliorate the discomfort caused by the feeling of suffocation, but will refuse to be hauled off."

Basically, Emanuel believes that after a certain point, life just isn't worth the hassle. I can't understand how Emanuel can say with a straight face that his attitude won't lead to an increase in euthanasia or suicide.

For Emanuel, life just isn't worthwhile if it isn't on his terms.

Back Up and Running.

Friday evening, before going to bed, I went onto Netflix to watch reruns of some of my favorite American TV programs. As I've mentioned before, I'm able to get around Neflix' geo restrictions thanks to Avast's Secureline VPN. Unfortunately, when I got up Saturday morning, the Secureline was down. Avast was experiencing technical problems and the app was down for about three days.

It's working now.

Fortunately for me, I had already replaced my faulty keyboard and I was able to do some much needed work on my Dumaguetecity.net website, as well as my Dumaguetewebsite blog.

Now that the VPN is back up and running, I'll go to the BBC website later today and catch up on the latest Dr. Who episode. But first, I'll continue to do a bit more work on the website.

You know what they say about all play and no work.

Finally, a New Keyboard.

A few weeks ago, my on again, off again problems with the keyboard on my P.C. became completely "off". The letters qwertyuiop would not type. There was no fixing the problem. I simply had to get a new keyboard.

It was late in the month and I hadn't budgeted for a new keyboard, so even though the keyboard wouldn't take a great deal of money, I decided to wait until my next payday.

That was a few days ago, and after grocery shopping and paying those bills that had to be paid, I purchased a new keyboard.

Now, I have no excuse not to write more often - other than due to the arrangement of the bedroom furniture, I have to stand while I write.

Now, it's just a matter of coming up with something interesting.

This week, there is the Buglasan Festival in Dumaguete. We'll be going to the parade this afternoon. There will be photos.

For the most part, my comments and photos pertaining to the festival will be posted on my DumagueteWebsite blog and my dumaguetecity.net website. Both need to be updated. I've neglected those two even more than I have this blog.

Expect the updates within the next few days.