From Today, The Days Are Getting Longer.

[SparklyKid]

Shorts ant T-shirt tomorrow, I wish.

[Maydup]

Ha! I was in a shop today and I overheard a man telling his wife that he needed to buy new shorts. He was on the same wavelength by the sounds of it.

[emmie]

oh goodness, me too sparkly.

[bobbinwales]

My postman was wearing shorts today

[bobbinwales]

and it was 3 degrees but felt below zero in the wind.

[MargoTester]

Our new postie can round in shorts today. He also sports long white hair and a long white beard - looked really comical. Unfortunately he wasn't wearing a red top and shorts

[10ClarionSt]

Yes, today is the first day of summer! Our postman wears shorts, too. I always think that anyone wearing shorts in this weather doesn't own a pair of trousers. Or can't afford a pair. But I didn't know that shorts were part of the RM uniform.

[Tilly2]

My postlady tells me that she wears shorts because legs are easier to dry than trousers.

[pixie374]

Can't wait... :-), was freezing today. We checked the times for "dusk" and it's the same today as yesterday. Does it take a few days, before it starts getting later? I always imagined it was very slowly consistent.

[Tilly2]

It always seems to take longer to get lighter than it does to get darker. Strange that.

[New Judge]

Strangely although yesterday (21st) was indeed the shortest day, it was not the day of the latest sunrise. The sun rose at 8:02 and 48 seconds yesterday. We have to wait until January 30th for the latest sunrise, when it will rise at 8:06 and 39 seconds.

[Tilly2]

Perhaps it depends on sunset, rather than sunrise?

[pixie374]

Oh! Thanks nj x

[pixie374]

Sunset was the same today and yesterday, tilly (according to my weather app), which is why I was wondering.

[lady-janine]

Shorts and t-shirts in evidence when I went shopping today. All the year round uniform for some I think.

[New Judge]

//Perhaps it depends on sunset, rather than sunrise//

It depends on the length of the day (the time between sunrise and sunset). Although the sunrise is still getting (very slightly) later each day, sunset is getting later by a greater amount, so the length of the day increases. As well as the latest sunrise being well after the shortest day, the earliest sunset (which you would also expect to be on the 21st December) is well before that date, occurring on 12th December.

The reasons for this are a bit complex but, basically, the length of a "solar day" (i.e. the time it takes for the sun to appear to return to the longitude you happen to be on) is not exactly 24 hours. It's sometimes more and sometimes less. 24 hours is used as a mean average length of a day but the actual length of a solar day can differ from 24 hours by as much as 16 and a half minutes. It varies due to effects caused by the tilt of the earth's axis and the fact that the orbit of the earth around the sun is not perfectly circular.

[Ellipsis]

Which is why we have leap years, to correct the rounding error ...

[Bobbisox1]

Hi Sparklykid, good times ahead eh :0)

[jennyjoan]

first time ever for me - haven't liked the dark nights at all so can't wait for the sunshine.

[barry1010]

Don't know why people think men wearing shorts in winter is odd - little girls had to wear skirts to school until recently.