Were you a little confused when you woke up this weekend? Your phone and cable box clocks all said one time, but then your coffee maker and car clocks were all an hour earlier. Did you enter a parallel universe?
Nope, Daylight Savings time kicked in Saturday morning while you were fast asleep. In case you always get confused about whether or not the clock is turned back or forward, since we’re almost to Spring, today was “spring forward” 1 hour. Some people think of this as the time when we lose an hour of sleep, but we prefer to think about how we gain an hour of sunlight at the end of the day. More specifically, we gain an hour of sunlight so that it’s not pitch black when we leave happy hour at our local pub.
Thinking about leaving happy hour while it’s still light outside got us to thinking about happy hour in general. Who created this designated time where friends get together after work and enjoy discounted food and drinks? Who is this mad genius?
We did a little poking around the Internet and unfortunately it looks like we can’t thank one specific person for their good idea. Happy hour actually first popped up in two different situations in the 1920s: Prohibition and aboard U.S. Navy ships. During Prohibition, happy hour was when drinkers would hang out to have a few drinks before going home for dinner; on U.S. Navy ships, happy hour was when there was scheduled entertainment for the crew. It looks like from there, the phrase just caught on. Happy hour really picked up in the 1970s and 1980s as something that was actually marketed by bars, usually taking place for a few hours anywhere from 4PM to 8PM.
Unfortunately, happy hour is actually illegal now in several states because the lawmakers are not into the idea of selling discounted drinks for a specific length of time. They think it encourages people to come in, drink heavily, and then drive home. Some states, however, are the opposite and are big fans of happy hour. It does seem, though, that even the states that don’t allow discounted drinks do allow discounted food during classic happy hour times. That means you can still drop by after work, buy a full-priced drink and enjoy some cheap appetizers. Hey, as long as we get a drink after work, we don’t care what we pay for it.
We don’t know about you but getting up this morning was extra rough. We’re going to be hitting up happy hour at the end of day, you should join us.