Tuesday, March 12, 2013

In the dark

The shift to Daylight Savings Time seems to be especially difficult this year, based on the amount of whining I've seen on various social media sites. Actually, I do think that since the dates of the shift to and from were moved (and therefore the immediate effect of the change heightened), it has been a bit more difficult to adjust.

For me, however, the change happened in conjunction with a couple of other things that make me feel as if I'm caught in the time stream without a T.A.R.D.I.S.

First, the coworker who gets to the office insanely early, as opposed to me, who arrives only ridiculously early, is on vacation. As a result, I walk into a completely dark office, turning lights on as I come through In order to turn on all the lights, you have to hit switches located at two far extremes of the room - the second one nowhere near an exit, but conveniently located just outside my office door.

Second, this is the week of Spring Break. Most students have fled for sunnier climes, and most of the faculty appear to have followed them. Campus is much quieter than usual.

The Recreation facility that lives in the same building as our office is taking advantage of the lower usage to shut down completely, giving them a chance to do some needed maintenance. From the looks of things, even the guy who owns the small Barber shop in the building has closed up and taken the week off.

The combination of the faculty flight and the closed Rec Plex means far, far fewer cars in the parking lot, thus better spaces (read: under cover spaces) to chose from. This is a good thing, since it is once again full dark when I get to work.

Third, because the Rec Plex is closed and the students living in the dorm tower on spring break, the building is locked down until  seven a.m., rather than opening at the usual five forty-five a.m. I've actually had to use my university ID card to swipe the lock the last couple of mornings.

It all combines to make the days feel a bit off. To cap the DST-warp, we had a very gloomy day yesterday; if we had an extra hour of sunlight at the end of the day, no one saw it.

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