FALL BACK

I never know whether to say Daylight Saving has begun or has ended.  At any rate, it just fell back, which always leads to a flurry of clock stoppings and startings.  You are never sure you got all of them straightened out until it’s time to change again.  I wish the powers that be would make up their mind.  The clock in the car waits patiently until it is time to spring forward again.

As people, we know we are going to gain or lose an hour of sleep, but try and tell that to the dogs.  I had not realized it before, but Charlie lives by the clock.  Breakfast is as soon as you get yourself out of a warm bed .  Norbert the postman, is a lovely chatty fellow, and Charlie senses his arrival at least a half hour before he actually arrives by lying by the front door and groaning slightly.  At three o’clock it is imperative that he check out the neighborhood with Dr. A.  Of course now, with the time change, all this takes place an hour earlier.  We had a visitor the other day and Charlie was his most obnoxious self, whining, begging pitifully, and generally making a nuisance of himself.  I looked at my clock and fount it was two o’clock, which according to him, was three o’clock walk time.  The afternoon feeding schedule is the same.  He has always chosen to go outside at ten, which is OK, but now that happens at nine, just as the clocks are chiming.

Since most dogs, Charlie included, sleep about 18 hours a day, it is surprising to me that his schedule has hit a bump, or that he notices it.  Once more he reminds me that you can’t underestimate a dog’s brain.  It’s best to simply go along with it.  It would be interesting to know what other pets suffer the same confusion.