7 Reasons

Tag: fall

  • 7 Reasons Not To Panic About Losing An Hour From Our Lives

    7 Reasons Not To Panic About Losing An Hour From Our Lives

    Yay! It’s Friday. In the words of Rebecca Black, “fun, fun, fun, fun, fun, fun, fun, fun, fun, back seat, woohoo!, are you old enough to drive? Fun, fun, fun, fun, fun!” There is even more reason to celebrate today because this weekend the clocks go forward. Lighter evenings here we come. Hang on! If the clocks go forward, doesn’t that mean we lose an hour from our lives? Well, yes it does. But don’t worry, here at 7 Reasons we have invested countless minutes researching and analysing this issue. And the good news is there is no need to panic. Here’s why:

    7 Reasons Not To Panic About Losing An Hour From Our Lives

    1.  Sleep. It’s only sleep we’re losing, and sleep is awful. When I’m asleep nothing of interest happens to me (unless I’m having the dream when I’m being chased around the dining room by a horse named Keith again), and I’d wager that nothing interesting happens to you either (possibly not even the Keith dream). Sleep just isn’t a desirable state for people. After all, narcolepsy is considered an illness, not a talent, and no one (except Audley Harrison) ever celebrates being knocked unconscious in a fight. That’s because sleep is rubbish. We’re all better off with less of it.

    2.  Sleep Walking. If you are having the dream in which you are being chased around the dining room by a horse called Keith, it might not be a dream at all. You wouldn’t know, you’re asleep. There is a possibility that it’s actually happening. Maybe, in your dream state, you got up, left the house and went to a local field. Here you crept up on a horse and shouted ‘Keith!’ in his ear. Keith stirred, got annoyed and then chased you back to your house. You didn’t shut the door in time so you spent the rest of the night being chased around the dining room table. Anyway, what I am trying to say is that this whole episode will last for one hour less on Sunday morning. And one hour less being chased by a horse called Keith means one hour less in which carnage can be created.

    3.  Awake. If you are not asleep, then the chances are you will be awake. Given that it will be 2am though, you won’t be sober. So from the flowerbed in the park you won’t even notice the disappearance of an hour. You’ll be too busy talking to a tulip.

    4.  Refund. If losing an hour from your life really hurts, don’t worry, you will automatically get it back in October. All you have to do is stay alive. Good luck!

    5.  Wood Pigeons. We can stand to lose an extra hour from our lives; I know this because of the wood pigeons. My wife and I were recently cooped up in a small room without the internet for several hours and we were forced to look out of the window for entertainment. The only things of note that we could see were a branch railway line and some trees. The trees contained wood pigeons. Here is a sample of the conversation:

    “Ooh look, darling. A wood pigeon.”

    “Yes dear.”

    “Ooh look, darling, there’s another wood pigeon. Look! Look! In the next tree.”

    “Yes dear.”

    “Which wood pigeon do you prefer?

    That is an hour we could happily have lost from our lives.

    6.  We’re Only Losing The Dark. It’s spring! It’s just going to get lighter. The hour we’re losing is an hour of darkness and who needs that anyway? Birds turn themselves off at night, so we’re getting an extra hour of birds, with all of the beaks, eyes and feathers that entails. Obviously that means there’ll be an extra hour of bird poo, but that means I get to see my apoplectic next door neighbour shake his fist at the sky and furiously wash his car more often. This is a bonus. More birds, people. More birds!*

    7.  Cure. Let’s be honest, if you are panicking about the clocks going forward, you are screwed. There is no cure for this ailment. So you have a choice, panic every year or stop being a tit and get on with it. 7 Reasons recommends the latter.

    *Except owls. Bugger.

  • 7 Reasons You Know it’s Autumn (in Yorkshire)

    7 Reasons You Know it’s Autumn (in Yorkshire)

    As I walked down the street yesterday, something suddenly hit me: It’s Autumn; here in Yorkshire.  Here’s how I can tell.

    The national flag of Yorkshire, the white rose symbol

    1.  Leaves.  The leaves turn brown and fall from the trees.  This, you may be thinking, is not unique to Yorkshire, and you would be correct.  But here, the leaves fall horizontally and, while I was walking down the street yesterday, a large wet leaf flew from a tree at incredible speed and slapped me in the face.  Aha, I thought, it must be autumn again.  And ouch.  And several minutes later, I developed the traditional Yorkshire ruddy complexion, which will probably last me until March.

    2.  Water.  You may also think that water isn’t unique to Yorkshire and once more, you would be correct.  But the fact is that wherever you live – unless you live in the sea – we probably have more of it than you.  Whenever there’s a drought in the UK we still have water, and it’s often transported to drier counties (usually Kent) via tanker.  And you can tell it’s autumn here because (incredibly) the daily rainfall increases from monsoon to biblical and our rivers get restless and start to explore the surrounding areas.  There’s one hanging around at the end of my street right now.

    3.  Mud.  You probably have mud in your gardens that you put your geraniums in, but that doesn’t really prepare you to see Yorkshire autumn mud.  I have no idea where it comes from, but our mud is epic.  All through the autumn, it’s bloody everywhere, just oozing from things:  From our riversides to our footpaths, it eventually covers our towns and cities in a sludgy goo.  In fact, Yorkshire is brown until the winter comes, and then it becomes brown and cold.

    4.  Darkness.  On some Autumn days in Yorkshire, it just doesn’t get light.  At all.  And, when you’re trying to do something in the kitchen at lunchtime (usually making lunch) and you have to switch the lights on, you know it’s autumn.  Or you’ve forgotten to open the blinds, but no one would blame you for that, as your view for this quarter of the year is mud, water, flying leaves and darkness.  If darkness is even a view.

    5.  Meanness. Yorkshire folk have quite a reputation for meanness.  Some of this is undeserved:  The rumour that branches of the Yorkshire Bank don’t have a safe but do, in fact, keep all of their money under a giant mattress is not true and was started by some horrible foreigner (or me, as I sometimes call myself).  But in the autumn, people in Yorkshire become chronically mean.  Only yesterday, as I walked through the wind and the rain, coat wrapped tightly around me, I saw a man being dragged along by a large umbrella step into a six-inch-deep puddle, soaking his leg.  And I laughed.  And that was when the leaf hit me. And he laughed back.  We’re mean in the autumn.

    6.  Millinery.  Now, it’s also a fanciful stereotype that Yorkshire men wear flat caps all the time.  This is not true.  Even Yorkshire men don’t wear flat caps in the summer.  How do you think many of them get their red, peeling scalps?  The flat cap is seldom donned until the autumn.  And then it’s worn pushed firmly onto the head to keep it from blowing away.  When you see flat caps you know it’s autumn in Yorkshire.  Or winter.  Or spring.

    7.  People.  Yorkshire is a beautiful place that rightly attracts a lot of tourists.  And in the summer, they’re everywhere.  Walking slowly and pointing.  In the autumn, however, they disappear.  I don’t know where they go: Perhaps they drown, perhaps they blow away, perhaps we just don’t see them in the darkness, but they do disappear.  Hopefully to somewhere nice as it’s bloody grim here right now.