Showing posts with label standardized time. Show all posts
Showing posts with label standardized time. Show all posts

Sunday, 2 November 2014

a silver lining

Today is a day that comes but once a year. It is a glorious day, to be sure.  It's the day when cats all across Canada and the United States stop savin' their daylight and go back to the standard way of doin' things.  That's right.  It's the end of Daylight Savings Time.  The day we cats get an extra hour in which to nap.  Like I said before... GLORIOUS.

Now when I say all cats, I actually mean most cats 'cause there are a few locales, up here in Canada, where daylight is never saved.  Nope, they just spend it as fast as it comes.  It's true.  In most of Saskatchewan and a few places scattered here and there in British Columbia, they keep things standardised, all-year-round.  I don't know why. They just do.  Easier in some ways, I suppose.  But they miss out on that extra hour of nappin' time which I, myself, so very much enjoyed, this mornin'.

Of course, they also don't lose an hour of nappin' every spring but, truth be told, neither do I.  As a rule, I don't allow myself to miss out on naps so whereas peeps may lose an hour of sleep in the spring, I don't.  I just nap instead of doin' somethin' else.  But then, what else would I be expected to do?  I'm a cat.  MOUSES!

Cats and peeps livin' in parts of the world where daylight is never saved might very well be inclined to think that all this movin' of the clocks back and forth is confusing.  It's really not.  Clocks get moved all the time.  Not wall clocks, so much.  They tend to stay put.  Big ol' grandfather clocks that weigh more than the peeps livin' in the house don't, either.  But little clocks get moved a lot. They get moved from the nightstand over to the dresser and then back to the nightstand, once more.  Yup, they get moved back and forth all the time.

Sometimes, these little clocks even take flight.  Occasionally, a clock will start ringin' its dinger off, as loud as can be.  That's when the peep closest to said clock will reach over, pick it up and throw it across the room.  The objective is for the clock to hit the wall so that the parts that are ringin' and dingin' will stop their unendin' singin'.  I've never witnessed this phenomenon in my own house but I've seen it happen on television so, you know, it must be true.

Of course, peeps with poor aim are very bad at this sport.  Clocks they fling usually miss the target on the wall.  I mean, they miss the target that is the wall, fallin' short and, perhaps, landin' on someone's head.  Thus the expression, watch out for flyin' clocks.  Okay, maybe that's not actually a real expression but seriously, I think perhaps it should be.  MOUSES!

But gettin' clocked on the side of the head.  Now, that IS a real expression for sure and, I suspect, it's origin has somethin' to do with clocks ringin' their dingers off just prior to takin' flight.  Again I must say, MOUSES!

Anywho...  while we're on the topic of clocks, let me tell you what happened at my house, the other day.

Picture it, Thursday mornin', my house.  Peep #1 wakes up and squints on account of all the sunshine shinin' in through the window.  She looks over at the little clock sittin' there, next to her, and sees that it says it's twenty minutes past six.  At first, the peep was quite happy to think that she could go back to sleep for another forty minutes or so.  The clock was set to ring at seven.

That's when alarms started goin' off inside the peep's head.  The peep was most definitely, alarmed.

My first peep had come to the realisation that there was no way, no how, that there could be that much sun shinin' through the window at twenty minutes past six.  Not here in Nova Scotia at the end of October.  At this time of year, the sun doesn't bother gettin' out of bed until about seven.  So at twenty minutes past six, it should still be dark outside. MOUSES!

Peep #1 peered at the little alarm clock, sittin' there. She looked at its face and narrowed her eyes.  Was the clock mockin' her?  Nope, it was dead.  Yup, her clock had stopped.  Dead as a doornail, it was.  Not that doornails are ever alive but dead as a doornail is just somethin' we say.

Now this clock in question had never once flown across a room, hit a wall or clocked anyone in head.  Nope, up until Thursday mornin', it had, in fact, led a rather sedentary life.  Perhaps that lifestyle is what had caused the thing to expire.  I doubt we will ever know.

The clock may not have flown but the peep sure did.  Ol' Peepers flew out of bed, scramblin' to find out just what time it really was.  Her paws barely touched the floor as she zoomed down into the kitchen, to check the times on the microwave and the stove.

Times.  Yes, I did say times.  Suffice it to say that the clocks in my house all sort of do as they please.  Not one of them ever agrees with any of the others.  They never have.  They probably never will.  The measuring of time by the peeps at my house tends to be an exercise in approximation, if you know what I mean.

Although the clocks on the microwave and stove were each claiming different times, they were in agreement that it was not twenty minutes past six.  They both agreed that it was actually after eight.  Ol' Peepers checked the mantle clock in the livin' room and found that it, too, said it was after eight although by a different number of minutes than either of the two clocks in the kitchen.

Peep #1 once again took flight, this time landin' at the front door.  She swung that ol' door open just in time to see the garbage truck rollin' down the street.

Okay, so it wasn't actually rolling but you get my drift, I am sure.  MOUSES!

Suffice it to say, I had one grumpy peep on my paws for the rest of the mornin'.  She was loaded with grumpiness.  The grumpies were oozin' out of her pores like sap on a maple.  Sticky and icky ol' sap.

Hmmm...  Peeps like maple stuff, don't they.  I should, perhaps, rephrase that.  She had grumpies oozin' out of her pores like sap on a pine tree.  No one likes that.  Believe me, I know.  Once, I got some of that gummy ol' pine tree sap on me.  It took me forever to get it out of my fur.

But I digress.  The point is, the peep was grumpy.  MOUSES!

Peep #1 had angry ol' storm clouds hangin' over her head.  Those storm clouds were comin' in as fast as fast could be and they all stopped directly over the peep.   All mornin' long, there were flashes of lightening and swirlin', tornado-like winds, encasing the peep with the storm of what could only be described as the grumpiness storm of the century.  Angry clouds of grumpiness were constantly replacin' each other, swirlin' in and around and about her.

I'm sure I saw actual clouds hangin' over Peep #1, all day long.  I'm absolutely certain of it.  I can't believe that they were only in my imagination.  No, that simply cannot be.  Of course, when one has been imbibing in the nip...  Nah, I'm positive I saw those storm clouds hangin' over her head.

But every cloud has a silver linin'.  Yup, every single one.  No matter how stormy that cloud may be, there is always a silver lining.

In this case, the silver lining was the fact that I, Nerissa the Cat, was handed a topic for today's blog post.  It was like it was handed to me right out of thin air.  Yup, a sparkling and gleaming silver linin', for sure.

And after this little incident, Peep #1 is now in contention for a spot on Canada's Grumpiest Peep Show on Reality TV...

Hmmm...  I'm thinkin' they should come up with a better name for that show.

Anywho...  Peep #1 is definitely in contention for bein' the country's grumpiest peep.  Oh yeah.

Oh, and in case you're wonderin' about the missin' of the garbage truck.  Let's just say that the first thing goin' out in the garbage on the next garbage day - which is almost a whole two weeks away - is one dead and broken alarm clock.  Yup, it should be takin' flight any moment now.  Takin' a direct flight to the garbage bin.  No passport required.  No luggage allowed.  MOUSES!