Clocks

Ok, it's daylight savings time again. Or, is it "off daylight savings time"? I am a college graduate...with high honors no less, and I still don't get it. I should live in Arizona. It's easier to understand "time" when it doesn't mysteriously "change". I do "get" that in October we get "more" sleep and in April, we get "less", but really, with me it's only about one thing.

Changing the blasted clocks.

I hate that chore. We have two clock radios by our bed. One for mr. herewegoagain, that is set to the right time, one for me that is always fifteen minutes fast. Twice a year I have to sit and stare at them and try to remember which tiny button I hold down while I push which other button to get to the right time. But at least they are sort of self-explanatory. We also have a bird clock and a train clock. (I know, I know). The bird clock was inherited from my dad. He was thrilled that each hour trilled a different bird call. My kids are growing up totally confused because in order to set THAT clock correctly, you are supposed to do all sorts of different things to make sure the bird call corresponds with the correct bird picture. I'm not an ornithologist, but even I know that I've messed up through the years when the "robin" sounds like a "mourning dove" (and let me tell you, that's a creepy bird call.) So now, I just shove the hand around to where the time is right and figure the birds will just sing whatever sounds good to them.

The train clock is my son's. It's a different whistle for a different engine. It can really startle you during the day, especially the whistles that include a conductor calling out station names, or engine numbers. For a minute you wonder if there is an intruder with a New York accent in that part of the house. I haven't changed that clock yet, because I'm SURE rowdy son will know if I get the engine's whistles wrong. I'm considering letting it just be "off" an hour for the next six months. We can practice addition that way.

The WORST one is my car. That requires getting out the owner's manual. I never think about it till I'm on the highway and then when I consider juggling the owner's manual, my diet coke and possibly a cell phone...well that's sort of a nightmare scenario. It takes ME in the passenger seat thumbing through to get it right which requires mr. herewegoagain driving my car. THAT's another nightmare scenario, so this year I've decided I'll simply go out to my car while it's in the driveway and change the clock that way. The sensible way. Yeah, except it's hot and buggy and frustrating and who designs these clocks anyway??? I have to go to menu, then input with the volume knob (or is the tuning knob?) and somehow get to the clock setting. THEN I have to be sure not to put the wrong "setting" on, or I'll have an alarm going off every day at that exact time for the next several years (that is already happening in my bedroom daily at 4 pm... when the stopwatch I bought for rowdy son's soccer game which is in the top drawer beeps the alarm I accidentally set on it). Why does everything have to have alarms? I'm terrified of the alarm setting on my cell phone, because now I know, once set, it may never be turned off again.

I just love my kitchen clock. I take it off the wall, turn the hands forward one hour, and hang it back up. Good thing too, because I broke the one on the stove years ago. Yep, it buzzes every day at noon.

So, between the birds, the trains, the buzzes and the alarms, I never really know what time it is. Mr. herewegoagain will say that's OK, as long as I still get to sleep longer than him.