Just because it's a strange alarm clock that's no reason it won't work. I should sleep. They're pretty good at alarming. If there's anything you can count on in alarm clocks it's that they wake you up when you don't want to get up, so not wanting to get up is a great way to have them go off. Just be cozy and revelling in how nice not being awake is and you're sure to wake up.
That doesn't make sense. The alarm clock can't go off if it's left off. And it isn't my alarm. It's not fair getting up by someone else's alarm. There's no guessing its sound, except the radio will be on Half Screeches, Half Sort Of Recognizable Songs Through What Sounds Like Thunder. It's the most popular alarm radio station, always on, even when the radio was set on news or Coordinated Universal Time In Morse Code.
The alarm has to be set because you want to wake up, but it won't wake you up unless you don't want to get up, so if you didn't want to get up you'd leave the alarm off, so the alarm wouldn't go off. This is perfect gibberish. It must come from those people trying to prove English logically inconsistent, hoping some suitable contradiction maybe involving the word ``forge'' will make the language vanish in a puff of Esperanto. Good luck, as long as the Language Academy hasn't got troops armed with pointy sticks and sarcasm.
I should test the alarm. I should have before going to bed, but if I could think ahead I wouldn't live in circumstances that made me get up at particular times, instead of just the right day. I'd have to give up being an astronaut; they get up at hours like 4:37 am, which isn't even possible. I'd also be excused from driving an interurban trolley, besides by living after 1923.
The clock's near. I see the digits. I know how long my arms are. I've perfectly missed it. The clock's around the bed. Maybe under the bed. Maybe under the table. Ow. That's the time set. The alarm set is ... it was the other way around. I set the time wrong. The time was ... I have no idea. Is there another clock? Yes: the oven clock downstairs. Just a minute.
The oven clock was probably not too wrong. Set the alarm to now and AAAAUGh the alarm was on. Half Screeches, Half Sort Of Recognizable Songs Through What Sounds Like Thunder. Turn it off. Advance the alarm set a minute and check the timing. That was the time set. Let's try again.
What if I fall asleep after the alarm and forget to set it to the morning's time? I'll find out in the morning, or afternoon, or tomorrow. This is what I get for catsitting (not on, next to).
AAAAAugh Half Screeches Etc is broadcasting. Noise off, set the alarm to ... the clock's ahead of the right time so I set the alarm to ... after I want to get up? Unless the oven clock was behind ... This is getting confusing, so I must be doing it right.
Sleep. Now. I'll wake up. Unless the power goes off. I should have brought my own travel alarm clock. Those go off whenever it's awkward. And the basic unit of awkwardness is arriving late at work because of oversleeping, equal to one thousand moments where one carries on a conversation after the other person politely signalled its ending.
Afraid of the power blinking? Anyone can be afraid of that. You should do better. Messing with the alarm is the sort of nearly-untraceable thing time warriors would do to alter future history to their advantage. That's a better fear. The future has no business depending on when I get out of bed; if they're going to then I'll just hit the snooze alarm.
Is there a snooze alarm?
No sense trying to sleep. I've never been more awake. The day starts anyway in ... five hours.
Maybe I'll answer my e-mail. That's worth ---
AAAAAGh! Half Screeches, Half Sort Of Recognizable Songs Through What Sounds Like Thunder! I gotta get up!
Trivia: Among inventions shown at Britain's 1851 Great Exhibition were alarm beds tipping the sleeper out at the appointed hour, and an alarm clock that not just rang a bell but also fired a pistol. Source: Compass: A Story of Exploration and Innovation, Alan Gurney.
Currently Reading: The Iron Whim: A Fragmented History of Typewriting, Darren Wershler-Henry. The focus on typewriting, the process, rather than hardware gives this an interestingly different focus compared to The Wonderful Writing Machine. But it keeps using ``amanuensis'', apparently unaware that the more the book uses it the less I believe it's actually a word.