What To Do With The Extra Hour, Based On Your Birth Month
When the clocks go back, an extra hour sounds like a small gift—until you’ve spent it answering messages or catching up on laundry. Sleeping through it is an excellent option. But if you’re awake and wondering what to do, here’s a little inspiration based on your birth month.
January: Stay In Bed
January, this hour can belong to the bed. Pull the blanket back over your shoulder, turn the pillow to the cool side, and enjoy having nowhere to be just yet. Maybe you fall asleep again. Maybe you listen to the rain or hear someone moving around in the kitchen. When you finally check the time, it’s earlier than you expected. You settle back in.
February: Follow Your Curiosity
Why does that street have such a strange name, February? You’ve wondered every time you’ve passed the sign, then promptly forgotten because you were on your way somewhere. Give one of those little questions your attention. Look up the name, read the history, follow the detail that interests you. Nobody’s asking for a presentation afterward. You can emerge from the hour with exactly one new fact that you’re disproportionately excited to tell someone over dinner.
March: Get Lost In A Book
March, the book is already there, with a receipt marking the page where you stopped when life got busy. Pick it up before you go looking for another recommendation. Read back a few pages if you’ve forgotten who’s who. Let yourself settle into the story until you’re no longer checking how many pages are left in the chapter. For once, when it gets good, you have time to keep going.
April: Try A New Recipe
April, pick something you’ve wanted to make but always pass over when you’re hungry and in a hurry. This time, there’s room to read the recipe before the pan gets hot. Grate the cheese, chop the herbs, and play something you can sing along to while you cook. Choose a recipe that fits comfortably inside the hour, including the part where you get to eat it. You might finish with a new favorite—or a very clear opinion about what you’ll do differently next time.
May: Sit Down For Breakfast
May, make the breakfast you usually decide is too much trouble, even if that only means toast while it’s still hot. Put it on a plate. Sit at the table instead of eating over the kitchen counter. You know that moment when the butter has just melted, the drink is the right temperature, and nothing needs stirring or fetching? Stay for that part. The crumbs can remain on the table until you’re finished eating.
June: Have The Long Phone Call
June, ask a friend when they’re free for a call—the kind where neither of you has to hang up just as the story gets interesting. You’ve been sending each other videos all week. Now there’s time for everything that happened between them.
Tell the story that takes too long to type. Ask what happened after the thing they were worried about. There can be pauses, digressions, an interruption while somebody finds their charger. You don’t need to reach a profound conclusion. Hearing each other laugh at the same ridiculous detail is a perfectly good use of the time.
July: Ask For The Story Behind A Photo
July, choose a photo you’ve seen a hundred times but know surprisingly little about. Who took it? Why was everyone dressed up? What happened just outside the frame? If someone who remembers is available, ask them, and write down the answer or record it with their permission. You might get a much better story than the one you’ve supplied in your head. Leave room for their version, including the names and small details you wouldn’t have known to ask about.
August: Play Dress-Up
August, put on the outfit you keep saving for an invitation that never seems to arrive. See what happens with different shoes, the earrings you forgot you owned, the jacket you thought didn’t go with anything. You can make a glorious mess of the bed in the process. There doesn’t have to be a photo, an audience, or a purchase. You might rediscover something you want to wear to dinner. You might spend twenty minutes looking wonderfully overdressed in your own hallway.
September: Fix One Small Annoyance
The loose drawer handle. You know the one, September. You adjust your grip every time you use it, tell yourself you’ll deal with it later, and then spend another week opening the drawer carefully.
Give that one small repair your attention, if it’s something you can safely do yourself. Find the right screwdriver, tighten the handle, put the tool away. Resist expanding the job into reorganizing the whole room. Open the drawer once more and enjoy how little you have to think about it now.
October: Go Somewhere You Choose
October, where would you go if nobody else had a preference? Spend a few minutes answering that, then use the rest of the hour for a small outing on your own. Browse the nearby shop everyone else walks past. Take the park path that doesn’t lead to anybody’s favorite café. You can linger over something without checking whether your companion is bored. You can also leave after ten minutes. There’s nobody beside you saying, “But we just got here.”
November: Make A Playlist You’ll Actually Listen To
November, start with a song you used to play until everyone around you knew the words. Add the one it reminds you of, then the one you’d forgotten until this very second. Listen while you build the playlist, even if that means stopping to play the same track twice. You might end up with the soundtrack to your first car, a particular friendship, or a year you haven’t thought about in ages. Give it a name you’ll recognize when you need a better soundtrack for the drive to work.
December: Put Something On The Calendar
December, use the hour to give yourself something specific to look forward to. Pick a modest plan that’s been living in the “sometime” category: a movie night with a friend, a walk together, an afternoon making that recipe you keep sending back and forth. Offer an actual date. Work out the one detail that usually keeps it hypothetical. If they’re busy, suggest another. There’s a particular pleasure in closing your calendar and knowing exactly when you’ll see someone you’re already excited to spend time with.