In most of Canada and the United States we switched to Daylight Saving Time today. Or, rather than doing it today, you might have moved your clocks ahead last night before going to bed if you’re an eager beaver. (As an aside, when people use the expression “eager beaver,” they’re referring to the animal, right? I’ve never been sure.)

I really like having the sun set later. Of course, I know that the calibration of our clocks is totally arbitrary. We could just as easily leave our clocks alone and tell everyone, “If you used to work from nine to five, you now work from eight to four. Please adjust the times of your other activities accordingly.” It would amount to the same thing.

Or we could have set our clocks differently to start with. For example, at some point in history someone could have said, “When Greenwich, England resident Leslie Horloges, known to this friends as Les, first sees the sun above the horizon on June 21, that’s going to be 12:00 a.m. everywhere in the world. Everyone’s clocks will advance at their normal pace from that point forward. Decide amongst yourselves when you’re going to do stuff in you’re locale and let the rest of us know so we won’t call you when you’re sleeping, but the time will always be the same for everyone, everywhere.”

Of course, if Les Horloges had slept in on June 21 of that year or if it was so cloudy in Greenwich on that day that the sun wasn’t visible, we would have been screwed. But, other than that, it would have worked.

Despite being cognizant of the arbitrariness of clock settings, because I’m a simpleton who is easily deluded, I still get a psychological boost from seeing daylight when, according to the clock on the wall, it’s evening.

That having been said, one thing that I really hate about switching to Daylight Saving Time is losing an hour this weekend. What with sleeping, eating, peeing, crapping and, of course, relaxing and napping, there are already too few hours in the day. Losing one is totally unacceptable. I’m willing to give up my enjoyment of evening daylight to keep that hour.

Here’s what I propose: Starting next year, let’s stop switching to Daylight Saving Time. However, I love getting that extra hour in the fall when we move our clocks backward, so let’s keep doing that.

Think of the benefits of my proposal. Consider the effect on babies born from this point on. If they live to just 72 “” which is not much of a stretch seeing as though the average lifespan in most developed countries is already beyond that and medical advances will likely lengthen it yet further “” they’ll pick-up 72 extra hours in their lives, one each autumn when they move their clocks back. That’s three extra days.

They could use those extra days for anything they want. For example, that would give them plenty of time to get their affairs in order “” or to have an affair “” before they die, without having to use any of their regular time to do so.

With ideas like these, I can’t figure out why I haven’t been elected ruler of the world yet.