DST delenda est!*

This may come as a surprise to some but this post was written yesterday.  Much as I love all you readers, there are limits to that love.  Getting up in time to write a post and get it posted by 0400 PDT is outside those limits.  Sorry.

So...We'll start with the updates.  Last Monday, I had been VERY pleasantly surprised that workers had arrived  and begun construction on el nuevo casa de juvat.  By Monday evening, the site looked like this.

I credit the close supervision of my resident experts.

Well....one of them anyways

Tuesday thru Thursday were a wash.

Literally!

7 inches of rain, Tuesday and Wednesday.

But...Friday, they were back and hard at it.

So as it stands now.

Mrs J inspecting the work.  She's Happy.....Therefore.......

We'll see how this week progresses.  Forecast is a moderate chance of rain early in the week.  Which puts me in a conundrum. (No Beans, not a prophylactic.)  Do I pray for rain to water the grass, reduce pollen and end the county burn ban so our spring break guests can roast marshmallows in the fire pit?  Or do I pray for no rain, so the workers can make further progress?

Yes.

Just me, Lord...being indecisive.


UPDATE: The workers showed up right on time today.

Now, back to our regularly scheduled broadcast.

As you are surely well aware (well except for readers in AZ, HI or in other countries), yesterday was "Spring Forward" day.  This, of course, is the day that we magically get another hour of daylight.  Truly.  The earth actually slows its rotational rate during daylight hours slowing the sunset for exactly one hour.

Or so Daylight Savings Time lovers would have you believe.

While I was working a regular job (as opposed to doing whatever Mrs J has on her mind at the moment), I enjoyed getting off work while it was still light outside.  It was nice.  However, driving in to work in the dark with suicidal deer along the highway (20 years here, 15 deer strikes.  WooHoo! Triple Ace!) took some of the joy out of that.

Now, if it's dark, time to go inside, if it's light, time to go outside.  Simpler times.

But there was this time...when I defeated Daylight Savings Time.

So....There I was**  Wing Scheduler for the Fighter Wing at Holloman AFB, in charge of  scheduling airspace (Air to Air Training), Ranges (Air to Ground Training), Low Level's (Air to Ground Training), Takeoff and Landing Block Times (Facilitate Maintenance and other ground related activities) for 4 fighter squadrons while deconflicting all the above with the F-15 Wing which used many of the same airspaces and White Sands Missile Range which launched and tested things that went "Boom". (They had priority.)

Source

Typically, each squadron would have a launch window,  3 times a day.  The window (IIRC) was 30 minutes long.

"Never let the facts interfere with a good Story, juvat!"

¡Sí, mi sargento de la Fuerza Aérea extraordinariamente viejo!

A mission would take about 4 hours start to finish.  Meaning, the briefing would start 2 hours prior to takeoff time, we would step to the jets about an hour prior to takeoff, start engines about 30 minutes prior, taxi about 15 prior to allow for end of runway arming and final check.  The mission would last between 1 and 1.3 hours depending on type. (And how ham-fisted the student was with the throttles.  "Hey, Lieutenant, you DO know the throttles have positions other than full afterburner and idle, don't you?") 

Source

 

Then there was a half hour period to put away your flight gear, grab a soda, and find a briefing room for the debrief.  That was the four hour window.  Debriefs took as long as they took.  No holds barred, and rank had very little privilege. (i.e. you still had to say "Sir" after the "WTF were you thinking?")

 

Source

So, we would rotate through these 4 hour blocks, by scheduling the 20 (or 30) minute block times for each squadron to launch.  Therefore, at any given time, each squadron had a different start of the day time.  We had Early-Early, Early-Late, Late-Early, and Late-Late.  Meaning first through fourth.  First brief for Early-Early, depending on daybreak, could be as early as 0400.  Late-Late would be somewhere around 0600.  Last brief would be around 1000 and 1600 respectively.

Before, I took over as Wing Scheduler, the other three squadrons progressed through the rotation from Late-Late down to Early-Early over a period of 4 weeks.  So, having to get up half an hour earlier every week.  For whatever reason, my squadron did it exactly opposite.  Going from Early-Early to Late-Late. 

Which sounds great.  Come to work half an hour later each week.  

Until you went back to Early Early,  Two hours earlier, every month.  The alarm going off at 0300 to make a 0400 briefing, sounded like the Hammers of Hell.  Mrs J didn't like it very much either.  She didn't have to get to her office til 0800.  

There were days....

Anyhow, I started the new job, and decided to find out why the rotation was the way it was.

The answer, of course, was....

"Zis is ze vay, ve haf alvays dunnit!"

To borrow a quote from last week's post, "Once more, into the breech, juvat"

I talked it over with Vegas, our Director of Operations who gave me the go ahead, but only if I got all 4 squadron commander's approval.  So, I figured out how to do the shuffle, and all that was required was for one squadron to remain at Early-Early for an extra week.

THAT took some salesmanship on my part.  Fortunately,while I was wearing him down, it turned into summer, so the early-early shift got the cool temps and smooth air that was missing in the PM.  Also, the days were long and they would be off work by about 2 for both those weeks.  That finally brought him around and the deal was done.

No more waking up two hours earlier, we could gradually "Ease" our way into the early-early schedule.

And that is how I defeated DST***...until yesterday.

This post's subject came to me yesterday morning at about 0437 when I woke up not remembering if I had reset my watch or not.  Since Mrs J and I like to go converse with the Big Guy at 0730, I couldn't afford to be wrong on this one.  Needless to say,  I got no more sleep so...I decided, after writing this, to go take a nap.



*Apologies to Cato the Censor who used a slightly different version of this statement (Carthago delenda est, Carthage must be destroyed) to end all his speeches.  I suppose the modern equivalent might be "Epstein didn't kill himself."

**SJC


***Texas has been trying to do away with DST for 20 years.  Unsuccessfully.  Another bill is supposed to be before the legislature this session also.  Hope it passes.  The entire state will be on Eastern Standard Time (AKA Central Daylight Time).