RIVER CITY JOURNAL: JUST IN THE NICK OF TIME, MEXICO CITY STEPS UP TO THE PLATE

My campaign for daylight-saving time isn't what you'd call a hot item.

Some of you are pretty blunt about it.

"Look, Joe," you say. "We've got really important things to worry about. Like aching feet and faulty serpentine belts in our cars and stuff like that."

Heck, I'll be the first to admit changing your clocks back and forth twice a year doesn't hold a candle to corn plasters and auto-repair bills.

But I'd still like to see daylight-saving time year around instead of just during the hot, humid months.

As far as I know, there is no national organization to lobby in Washington for full-time daylight-saving time. Occasionally, someone will write or call and say, "By gum, you're right, Joe. We need to do something about this."

Of course, no one does.

Sometimes I think being a DST champion can be just as frustrating as building a downtown golf course.

But I don't intend to give up.

As a matter of fact, I heard this week that I've picked up some pretty powerful support for daylight-saving time. And it's from someone I wouldn't ever have suspected cared about which way the clocks are set.

I heard the mayor of Mexico City -- that's the one in Mexico, as in south of the border -- wants daylight-saving time. Or maybe he wants to get ride of it. Either way, he's in favor of leaving your clocks alone, which is the main thing.

Anyone who knows me also knows that I won't travel to Mexico.

Sure, there are some mighty fine tourist spots. At least they look mighty fine in the brochures I see. And of all the places in the world you can travel to, Mexican resorts seem to be the most affordable. So Mexico has a lot going for it in the way of tourism.

But I won't go there.

I'm afraid I'd wind up in a Mexican jail on some trumped-up charge. And I don't have enough money to bribe anybody, not even in pesos.

So, in order to avoid any possibility of spending any time in a Mexican jail, I stay out of Mexico. I call it the abstinence policy.

You know what?

I'm so pleased to hear that the mayor of Mexico City is on my side that I'm giving serious thought to throwing caution to the wind and going to Mexico City to see the mayor.

He needs to know he has support. I'll bet he feels like I do: a Don Quixote of clocks.

When you're right and you know you're right and you don't get a lot of support and nothing changes, you can get a complex. The last thing the mayor of Mexico City needs right now is a complex.

Vincente Fox, the new president of Mexico, apparently is in favor of daylight-saving time. Or against it. Whatever the Mexico City mayor is for, Fox is against.

Those two fellows ought to try to get along. Being a new president, Fox could use the backing of as many Mexicans as he can find, and you can find about umpteen million in Mexico City. So if those folks want to stop changing their clocks twice a year, I'd find a way to make that happen.

I think a president ought to be able to pull that off.

Here's the best part: If el presidente Vincente Fox fixes the time problem in Mexico, President George W. Bush might see what's going on and think to himself that he could fix this spring forward-leap back mess right here in the U.S. of A.

Then it would spread to Canada and South America and anywhere where people are tired of losing an hour of sleep and gaining it back a few months later only to lose it again in another few months.

If you want to join this campaign, please write to the mayor of Mexico City and let him know his neighbors to the north are behind him 100 percent. The official address: Mayor of Mexico City, Mexico City, Mexico.

I don't know the ZIP Code.

Maybe Mexico doesn't have ZIP Codes.

See. There's something else we might want to think about.

But let's start with this clock thing first.

Then ZIP Codes.

Then those annoying stickers they put on pears and apples.

And then the world.

Don Quixote would be proud.