Making Sense of Day Light Savings Time

Folks in US would have gotten an extra hour of sleep today as the country rolled back the clock by an hour 2:00 AM last night ending the daylight savings time. I have heard many explanations for this bi-annual ritual, but none really made sense.

To add to the mystery, US congress has decided to extend the Daylight Savings by a month from next year, by commencing early and ending in November, past the Halloween weekend. So, in 2007 Daylight Savings Times will begin on March 11 and end November 4 (as compared to April 2 and October 29 in 2006)

Till I was in US, this change never really affected me, but now that I am in India, I am feeling the impact of this switch. Actually, I will start feeling the impact of this switch from tomorrow as I start taking my regular conference calls with my colleagues in US, which will stretch one more hour in to the night.

Generally, most of my calls with US colleagues are done between 8:00 AM - 11:00 AM ET which was 5:30 PM - 8:30 PM till Friday and now it is 6:30 PM - 9:30 PM. Now here is another challenge we run in to.. trying to find a suitable time zone for conference calls with folks in India & US. I hear you saying.. Welcome to the flat world..!!!!