New Alarm Clock

This past weekend when we went shopping, I was waiting outside the dressing rooms at one of the department stores while my son was trying on pants. I happened to spy one of those displays with gifts that often are out at the holiday times, so I walked over to check the stuff out. Among the various things were boxes of alarm clocks.

Now, my current CD player alarm clock is one I've had for over 15 years. The CD player actually gets stuck a lot and the face place has come unglued over time and slides down. It isn't a bad clock really. However, these new ones had something interesting going for them - they could work with an iPod!

Yeah, the wheels were turning. I was thinking "well, if I got an iPod for Christmas, I'd need someplace to charge it". This GPX clock radio could do that, and you could actually awaken with music from your iPod as a source. We got my son a similar type of clock for his birthday with his iPod, and this one was a much better price - and it had a $10 mail in rebate to boot.

I picked up the box, trotted over to where my wife was and asked if I could get it. I think she followed my silent thinking and said it was fine. So, I got myself a new clock and have something to dock my iPod I should be getting at Christmas. Win-win.

Or so I thought. Turns out this clock has a few fun features I did not know about.

For example, it has a lighted display with three settings - dim, brighter and super-nova bright. Okay, no problem. I can put it on dim. Well, damn if that dim isn't bright enough to act as a beacon for those return trips from the bathroom in the middle of the night. Seriously, all it needs is a fog-horn and it could bring in the ships. Okay, I can live with that. And, yes, I have to now roll over and fall asleep the other way to avoid the "dim" light in my face. Not a problem.

Next comes the alarm. You can do radio, iPod or buzzer. I've never been a buzzer person and since no iPod yet, I go radio. That's cool. Found a station I like that comes in and set the volume. Good to go. Well, not quite. When the alarm goes off, hitting the snooze is easy (biggest bar and all). Even without my glasses on I can hit that without a problem. But, the display goes from "dim" to super-nova when the alarm goes off and stays that way. I guess it is to help further wake you up. Gak. So, I hit snooze, roll over and avoid the interrogation lamps beating down at me.

Now, I'm a three snooze kind of person (my old clock each snooze was eight minutes). Guess what? This clock's snooze is nine minutes. So, I have to recalculate the first alarm time so I am up when I want to be (no later than 5:15am). Grumble grumble. Okay, just a minor annoyance. Most likely I'll switch it over to two snoozes and move on.

Lastly, turning the darn alarm off. On my old clock, it was easy. Button just up and to the right of the snooze. Actually, that was too convenient as you could hit the off by accident. Not so easy on this new clock. The off button is the power button on the upper left. A small button. Not something I can hit easily from lying in bed. I've found I have to snooze it first, sit up, put on my glasses and then locate the power button to turn it off. I guess that's a motivator to get me out of bed on time.

I guess I'll just have to adjust to the changes. Change is good. Or, at the very least, change keeps us on our toes.