GMT Millennium for Boston By Ben Fenton in Washington

BOSTONIANS have reacted with a mixture of incredulity and pique to the news that their city will enter the new Millennium five hours before the rest of America by temporarily joining London's time zone.

Mayor Thomas Menino announced that Boston would mark the start of the new era at midnight GMT, surprising many residents of the city which staged the famous tea party of 1773. The latest party in the Massachusetts capital will begin at 7pm local time.

"Greenwich is the universally accepted standard of time for the world," Mr Menino said, adding that his decision will have the added benefit of allowing children to join their parents in celebration and let families return home before they could be affected by the so-called Millennium Bug. The celebrations will feature a parade, a 60-second countdown using a giant television screen showing a live broadcast from Greenwich and a fireworks display.

The biggest complaints yesterday came from teenagers and students at the numerous higher education establishments in and around the city, like Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. They are upset that the decision to go for a premature midnight will strengthen the teasing of Bostonians by their neighbours and fierce sporting rivals down the coast in New York that Boston has no nightlife.

Denizens of the City That Never Sleeps already refer to Boston as the City That Tucks Up Early and joke that nighttime baseball games in "Beantown" are usually played before away fans only.

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), September 24, 1999

Answers

I can see it now--everyone's counting off with their cousins across the pond when suddenly BING London goes dark, and people are standing in Fanueil Hall going "huh?" About ten seconds later they'll start going "uh-oh."

-- Spidey (in@jam.copley), September 24, 1999.

Spidey wrote: suddenly BING London goes dark

Looks like a good subject for a bet to me. Any takers?

-- Richard Dymond (rjdymond@hotmail.com), September 24, 1999.

Good idea IMO.(The GMT thingy, not the wagering type anymore) Why would anyone look forward to riding the T home with the possibility of power outages?!

-- Barb (awaltrip@telepath.com), September 24, 1999.

Or riding the T at any time?

-- Spidey (in@jam.Storrow), September 24, 1999.

Interesting concept, but somebody needs a little Prozac if they think that this will actually do anything. "Well. It's 7:30. Party's over. Time to go to bed." You bet.

-- Dave (aaa@aaa.com), September 24, 1999.

7:00, ay? I always thought that Bostonians had a fair share of anglophile intellectuals, but right now I am too jacked up on 3 cups of coffee to think without tinges of paranoia. Quite possibly, the citygov said, "Hey, we're gonna be unduh curfew befwour midnight. Yous bettuh be outtuh the way so's the National Gahd can pahk their ahmud cahs."

-- coprolith (coproltith@rocketship.com), September 24, 1999.

LOL, Coprolith!
Now of course teenager neeners are MUCH more important than safety considerations ...

-- Ashton & Leska in Cascadia (allaha@earthlink.net), September 24, 1999.

What makes you think OUR power will still be up at 12:01 GMT? Lots of utilities apparently use Universal (GMT) Time for all control functions, so we'll be rolling over midnight when London does.

We're telling everyone here to be offgrid at 3:00 PM because our grid rolls over at 4:00. Go ahead, start your fire, turn on battery radio, throw all the breakers.

-- bw (home@puget.sound), September 24, 1999.

This household will be off the grid, eating a hot meal and watching the world go dark. I will be on the computor and watching TV at at the same time, until my computer crashes. Then it will just be the TV. We have two sentry lights in our yard so I can tell if the grid is running or not, even tho we are on the generator. We have been running on generator all day Saturdays. Hubby wants to get some hours on it. Its 40kw and running everything normally, including two AC units we draw less than 60 amps. Much to our suprise, its only burning a gal/hour of diesel. We were told to expect 2 gal/hour. Taz

-- Taz (Taz@aol.com), September 24, 1999.

Wow! You gonna have AC, Taz? I know where I'll be. . . Just kidding. We always celebrate at 7 eastern, one, because it's my NYE and, two, because we got married NYE in Scotland 13 years ago so it's our anniversary dinner too. And three, we're such old gits we can't stay up much past seven anyway! I think we'll nap in the afternoon to stay up for midnight this year, though.

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), September 24, 1999.

Most of the people I speak to around here (Bahston Area) are clueless to y2k. I hear things like, "TPTB have always taken car of us, and well we survived the Blizzard of '78," etc., etc. Than you have to consider that Governor Celluci has announced that he will be in Florida on the 1st for his annual winter vacation and that the City of Boston has been declared 100% ready for y2k! However, the FAQ's in www.nees.com which is the parent company for my electric company are advising us to prepare for a one week winter storm! I believe them!

-- Jim (Y2KStressedout@aol.com), September 25, 1999.