In my hometown of Lund, Sweden, today sunrise occurred at 08:35 AM CET and sunset at 03:36 PM CET. We had daylight (sort of) only for 7 hours and 57 seconds. Tomorrow on December 22nd we will have approximately the same times for both sunrise and sunset but the day will be less than a second shorter.
After these two days the days will get steadily longer everyday until the Summer solstice occurs on June 21st 2015, when we will have daylight for 17:32:40. Further north in the country the swings in daylight are even more dramatic, where the sun never rises or sets North of the Polar Circle.
It isn't at all strange that we Scandinavians go crazy with mood swings during winters and summers.