EMPS: Measuring Time in Ages of Clocks

For Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot #18: Watching The Clock, Carly (naturally enough wants to see some clocks. I think I've shown off all our clocks in this blog at one time or another, except maybe for the old nonfunctioning mantle clock, and I don't know where that is. But here we go anyway.

Wait a sec - could the mantle clock be in the library closet? It is!

His grandfather's clock's not too tall for the shelf.

From my Picasa album EMPS

Not exactly in a place of honor, is it? But at least it's survived our many purges of old stuff. This belonged to John's grandfather. I don't think there's any more to the story than that. It's a little banged up, and I doubt that it's in working order. But the main reason it's in a closet, aside from the fact that display space is at a premium here at the Museum of the Weird, is that it doesn't fit the MotW's midcentury modern aesthetic.

A 2005 photo of a vintage modern clock, never to run again.

Now here's a clock that suits John's enjoyment of all things retro moderne. Probably close to 50 years old, it's an eBay purchase from nearly a decade ago. Unfortunately it needs a new motor, which is unlikely to happen. But John likes the bright red plastic and the updated art deco look of it, and so this, too, has survived purging. Just last night John pulled it out of a box, thought about whether to keep it, and put it back in the box.

My clock radio celebrates a radio station that's long gone.

This next clock doesn't approach the age of the first two, but it dates back to the 1990s, which is impressive enough for a clock radio. I don't know about your experience in this area, but I find that the alarms on clock radios tend to stop working properly after a few years. This one still wakes me up, though, when I need such things. The stickers on it are for Cool 92.9, the oldies station where I once knew most of the disk jockeys personally, and contributed song lists for their My Three Songs and Top Five at Five features. Then my friend Rich "Brother" Robbin was canned by the soulless corporate overlords, and within a year the station was essentially gone, with no live disc jockeys and a nonsensical and unlistenable playlist. Cool and its oldies later came back on a low power AM frequency, but I couldn't get that on my radio and anyway, the magic was gone.

John's tres moderne clock from Denmark - at Christmas

Retaining a place of honor among the Christmas decorations is this modern teal green clock John bought in the Netherlands nearly a decade ago. (I'm pretty sure it was made in Denmark, though, making it Danish modern.) I've photographed it before, repeatedly, but not usually with such festive surroundings!

John's non-vintage but modern alarm clock.

Here is John's current alarm clock. It's from Target, I think, but he also has a vintage ball clock somewhere that doesn't work as reliably. I've never managed to figure out how to turn this clock's alarm off, which can be a problem if I'm in bed and he gets up before the alarm.

My Rumor, with two alerts from some Facebook malarkey.

Finally, here's the clock I actually use the most: my LG Rumor phone. I got this over the summer. The missed alerts on it were from a Facebook quiz thing. It was trying to sell me some texting game, so I deleted the alerts. The last time I sent and received texts, my cell bill doubled.

Carly also asks for a photo of a clock showing our favorite time of day. I'm not sure I have one right now. It's no secret I'm a night person, and historically I've gotten in most of my computer time between 9 PM and 5 AM. But since my becoming unemployed, my sleep schedule has become even more screwed up, if that's possible. I've been sleeping part of the night, blogging, and then going back to bed at midmorning. Go figure!

Be sure to check Carly's blog Ellipsis every Monday for the week's EMPS assignment, along with links to the previous week's entries. And while you're at it, how about joining in?

Karen