Next Saturday night sees me head off to Luton Airport after the football.  A night in my hotel will be cut short by the need to wake up at around 5am, dress, and take a ten minute walk with my tiny Wizz Air compliant hand luggage to the airport terminal.

There is an obvious risk of oversleeping and missing my flight, although my middle aged man requirement to head to the gents at 4am should mitigate that.

Indeed, as I made that necessary trek this morning it struck me that my early flight occurs shortly after the clocks have gone forwards by an hour.  Do I set my alarm for an hour earlier just in case my phone doesn’t pick up the time change?  Do I end up nervously checking my phone throughout the night and end up finding the deepest slumber to pull out of just before 5am?  Do I ask the hotel for an alarm call and do I trust them on it?

It’s a situation that is actually making me quite nervous.

And one that reminds me what a ridiculous concept “daylight saving time” is.  Let’s face it, shifting a dial one way or another twice a year doesn’t affect the amount of daylight that the movement of planet earth around the sun affords us.  It doesn’t change the number of hours a farmer can spend milking his cows.  It doesn’t stop an individual from using a bloody torch if it’s dark out.

But it does rather increase the possibility of me missing this plane.  Or being ridiculously tired when I set foot on it.  Or the manager of Luton Airport’s Aspire Lounge turning up late for work meaning I have to pay for a coffee instead of getting one for nothing alongside a free bacon sandwich courtesy of American Express.

Putting the Final Touches to Chile