G'morning David,

 DW> In my extreme youth, in WW2 England, clocks were set ahead twice during
 DW> the spring, to "Double Summer Time", and back twice
during the fall.
 DW> This meant that in midsummer, people could be seen mowing their lawns
 DW> at midnight or later. Of course, very few people used artificial light
 DW> during summer, which made the "blackout" easy to enforce.

Ah me ... I used to lie awake reading in those wunnerful days, or 
post myself at the bedroom window to watch songbirds, spot Jerry 
planes ... or the Homeguard exercising over the Rugby School 
playing fields (the Headmaster of the Lower School was the local 
HG Commander).

 DW> I have here a table of sunrise times for latitudes in North
 DW> America. At latitude 35 deg. N, which is about average for
 DW> the continent, the sun rises on March 10 at 6:18a.m., local
 DW> mean time. On November 3, it rises at 6:22 a.m.. I chose
 DW> those two dates to be typical of the second Sunday in March
 DW> and the first Sunday in November, which are the dates, by the
 DW> new rules, for the clock changes. So, within four minutes,
 DW> the times of sunrise are the same on these dates, which means
 DW> that the new rules will be pretty good in this respect.

Mmmm... Auckland's at 37 deg. S, and the local tide and sun tables 
show this...

   Date    Rise  Sets
___------------------------
18 Mar 06  0721  1936  DST
19 Mar 06  0622  1835  NZST

30 Sep 06  0559  1823  NZST
01 Oct 06  0658  1924  DST
___------------------------

Here, the differences seem much wider in the morning - and closer 
in the evening...

 DW> Incidentally, the mnemonics "spring ahead" and "fall
back"
 DW> are often used here to remember the directions in which the
 DW> clocks change. But the new rules will make the "ahead" change
 DW> occur in what is technically winter. "Winter ahead" somehow
 DW> doesn't have the right ring.

The word "fall" lacks the meaning of autumn for Kiwis,  but that 
doesn't stop the more strident media chanting the same mnemonics !

Local comics make much mileage with quips like "Fall back - right 
over the **** cat" and the like.

Your WW2 comment also reminds me how much I used to enjoy getting 
up early to stroll the streets, school and local Recreational 
Ground in wartime summer,  the world asleep in the dawn light  -  
even though I once got a machinegun blast from a lone ME109 for 
waving and jumping up and down like a lunatic....

There was no Occupational Health and Safety rules to take refuge 
in then....

Miles. 
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