Sunday Rerun: Earache, my eye

Even though my daily pace has been measured at somewhere between "glacial" and "somnambulent," there is one thing you can say about me.  I am an early riser.  The cats don't even bother dive -bombing me awake any more; they know they can count on me shuffling down to the kitchen and doling out the Tuna 'n' Kibble while Marty Bass is still tieing his tie. 

Remember us?

I can't rely on the old Native American trick of guzzling a gallon of water just before shutting the peepers so as to guarantee an early wakeup, so I use an alarm clock.  And the one that I've been using has just been relegated to second-string status, sitting in my den with the sole job of keeping my second-string iPod charged.  

And why?  Simple?  It had the annoying feature of the alarm, whether on buzzer or radio, starting out super quiet and then gradually getting louder.

Very annoying, to me, at least. It's like someone trying to awaken you by whispering in your ear for a few seconds and then ramping it up to a bellow in a while.  

Look at this way...if an emergency vehicle is behind you and you are so intently listening to Adele rolling around in deep deep sorrow that you don't see the 27 flashing lights behind you, the driver will hit the siren. And that siren starts off loud and stays that way. 

So what I want in an alarm is something that says "Wake up!" And not something that says,"hey listen Mark good morning it's Friday and it looks like a sunny day with temps in the 60s so anytime you see fit to go ahead and get your socks on and feed the cats and empty the dishwasher and make coffee and tea, that would be great..."

(Click on the highlighted words "wake up" to hear an explanation for today's title.)

Nope.  Wake me up so I stay that way!  

And the other plus of the new clock radio is that I will be one minute earlier getting downstairs to see the morning news.  The old one, you hit the snooze button and you got ten more minutes in the arms of Morpheus.  This new one, the snooze cycle is NINE minutes!

See you in the morning!