Just in case you forgot, you were supposed to spring forward last night

Where did that hour go? Inexplicably, overnight, 60 minutes slipped away. Now instead of a leisurely Sunday, there's that nagging feeling you're running late.

Blame Benjamin Franklin. Ahead of his time, as always, the founding father once advocated rousing people at dawn with cannons "to wake the sluggards," and conserve candles.

The United States instituted Daylight Saving Time briefly during World War I and II to save energy. It became official in 1966. In 2007, Congress extended Daylight Saving Time, changing the start date from April to March and the end date from October to November.

So what does that lost hour of dreams mean to a nation that experts say isn't getting enough sleep anyway? We took the time to find out.

Health

• The American Academy of Sleep Medicine, located in suburban Cook County, estimates 50 million to 70 million Americans suffer from sleep disorders.

• Sleeping less than seven hours a night can heighten the risk of diabetes, high blood pressure, obesity and depression.

• Studies indicate springing forward can cause restlessness at night. The negative effects of the time change can persist for a while, particularly among night owls. "It depends how sensitive you are to these kinds of changes," said Tahseen Mohammed, a psychiatrist with Northwest Community Hospital and University of Illinois at Chicago.

• If you do wake up feeling sluggish today, brisk exercise will help release positive chemicals in the brain to counteract your stupor, Mohammed suggests. To adjust to the time change, eat dinner earlier than normal, avoid coffee and other stimulants in the evening and get to bed earlier. "It's time to get the amount of sleep your body needs," Mohammed said.

• What's the recommended amount of sleep for adults? Seven to nine hours a night, experts advise.

• Looking on the bright side, medical experts suggest that longer days and greater exposure to sunshine has a positive effect on seasonal affective disorder.

Energy

• You'd think being able to use natural light longer in spring and summer would be an energy saving no-brainer. And, in the 1970s, the U.S. Department of Transportation concluded that electricity usage would be reduced by 1 percent a day with DST. So much has changed since the '70s, however, that the data is outdated, DOT officials said.

• A 2008 U.S. Department of Energy report on the impact of extending DST on energy conservation found a savings of .03 percent in electricity consumption a year. Gasoline consumption savings were so minimal, researchers considered them statistically insignificant.

Factoids

• After World War I, farmers opposing Daylight Saving Time successfully had the policy repealed.

• Federal law doesn't mandate any state to follow DST although most do.

Sources: "Seize the Daylight" by David Prerau, U.S. Department of Energy, California Energy Commission, American Academy of Sleep Medicine.

This text is replaced by the Flash movie.