To some, time is like a bespectacled, bookish, disapproving spinster. Yet also, in a long-stockinged librarian kind of way, it’s a reassuring reminder of our shared humanity. For others time is a futile attempt to tame the snorting stallion of chaotic meaningless that is existence. Numerical cannon fodder in the face of all that has gone before, all that is now, and that thing you had pencilled in for 2pm next Tuesday with Brian from work.

I sympathise with the latter because without collective calibration we wouldn’t have watches, and you can’t beat a good antique timepiece. Well, I think so. You, on the other hand, may prefer chunky monstrosities atop the rump of the ulna – all dials and things for measuring the heart beat of a passing stoat on your next orienteering weekend.

You have an extra hour to kill. Colin Montgomery suggests some ways to despatch those 60 minutes...

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Clearly the horological haughtiness of that last statement proves that I’m a time snob. But, my aesthetic arrogance aside, we’re all sharing time together. We sup the same atomic stew of hours. We eat at the same trough of ticks and tocks. And since 29th October, we have an extra 60 minutes to consume. Yum.
Everything’s just been shunted back. But I prefer to continue to think of it as an extra hour. Such wilfully stupid speculation may have the ghost of Einstein weeping into his relativity soup – for the second time – insolent neutrinos having already poked him in the eye (in the blink of an eye). I care not. For, in an absurd corporate kleptocracy shored up by unscrupulous toffs skilled only in patronising doublespeak and greedy connivance, if I fancy pretending I have an hour to spare, I shall revel in said imaginary gain.

On the basis that we do have more time to kill, I have a few suggestions on how to rid yourself of the surplus seconds… all 3,600 of them.

Stare out a Russell Hobbes
Watched kettles never boil. That’s true. I watched one once, from a hide designed to look like a fridge. Said kettle raided the biscuit barrel, left a crude note about the washing up and broke the egg timer. It did everything but boil. Other element-driven devices may not be quite so puckish. You may find that instead they simply turn your kitchen into a peasouper of a day in Whitechapel circa 1888. But that can be relaxing, the perfect steamy antidote to the daily sturm und drang of the end days of global capitalism. Prepare to be enveloped and forget the financial farce for an hour. Aaaahhhh.

Walk for an hour in a randomly decided direction
This one’s simple but fun. Remember ‘Spin the Bottle’? Well replace ‘a snog with that rabbity looking girl sat across from you’ with ‘walk an hour in the direction the spun bottle ends up pointing towards’. So, for example, if it points northwest you walk northwest for an hour. Who knows where you’ll end up? It’s a bit like the work of the Rankin Family meets Treasure Hunt. Of course, there’s always a catch. You may walk off a cliff. Or, even worse, into an international clown convention. But that’s the point. It’s geographical roulette.

Write a postcard a minute for an hour
“Dear Auntie Jessie, arrived safe at Hotel del Burro. Weather bilin’. Fellow guests a rag bag of Little Englander twats who shout at waiters and hide behind overpriced copies of The Daily Mail.” Your common or garden postcard is normally a pile of pish. So why not take an hour out to challenge the semiotics of this most ancient of mediums (it’s true, they found a whole bunch of Roman ones in Northumberland – the Vindolanda Tablets). Your challenge is, buy 60 random postcards, write one a minute – documenting your feelings during that minute – and send it to a friend, relative, or local vicar.

Play You Suffer by Napalm Death 3,600 times in a row
Grandfathers of Grindcore, Napalm Death bawled their way into the Guinness Book of Records in 1987 with You Suffer. At one second long, it’s still the shortest record on er…record. It’s like a rabbit punch to your inner anvil. Listen to it 3,600 times in a row. Go on, I dare you. You may well go mad. Or find yourself unable to eat cheese for a week. But you’ll sure as hell remember that extra hour. Forever.

Donate an hour to a local Bond villain
Ever since Dr No cocked things up, Bond baddies have been shockingly poor at managing their time. Always wasting a few more minutes to revel in their nefarious doings. Or making a right old arse of an ostensibly simple missile launch thanks to dicking about in a piranha farm. All they needed was a little more time. No more excuses, I’m going to give them that time. Just half an hour though, I don’t want to make it too easy. All together now… Goodbye Mr Bond.