As a newspaper reporter and photographer, I’m supposed to know what is going on around us all the time but, boy, I dropped the ball overnight Saturday: Daylights Savings Time arrived and I didn’t know it until I noticed that my computer time was an hour ahead of my watch (and old-fashioned mechanical timepiece).

With Daylight Savings Time, we “Spring forward” and “Fall Back,” which means see lose an hour out of the day when it arrives this time of year and we will spend the next several months trying to catch up.

I normally wake up at 0500 (5 a.m. EDT), but the meds I take for pain start running out of protection about five hours out and it was 0600 when I stumbled into the bathroom this morning and gobbled my Tramadol, Bayer Back & Body, and Tylenol Extra Strength capsules for arthritis.

When I could not pick up one of the pill bottles because my arthritic right hand could not function, I knew something was amiss. The computer had reset. So had a couple of Citizens’ watches that run on sunlight and reset themselves at 0200 each morning via the Atomic Time Clock in Colorado.

My oldest Eco-Drive watch was purchased in the 1990s to replace my trusty mechanical GMT-II Rolex that kept me up-to-date in the various time zones visited as a globe-trotting reporter and photographer but such watches also became targets of thefts when visiting less-than safe areas. The Citizens was more accurate, provided time in time zones around the world and never needed a battery. It remains my most accurate and dependable watch.

Technology saved the day but I’m heading back to bed to let the meds kick in. The thermometer reads 13 degrees outside and a brisk wind is driving the wind chill down into single digits.

Spring arrives in seven days. Let’s hope Mother Nature doesn’t have a bad hair day.