Gizmos: Part II

Gizmos are taking over the world.

Right after I wrote about the discovery of all sorts of “added features” in my Subaru, after many of you reported stories of features you’d discovered; I went for a ride.

Without doing anything, without bumping something or getting close to something or breathing wrong; an alarm went off. A high-pitched squeal. I frantically looked for the icon that was supposed to tell me what was wrong. Where was the icon supposed to be? Which of the 32 different icons in the manual could it be? What was wrong?

And then it stopped.

I don’t know what caused it. I’m left with a slight unease wondering what hazard is percolating, waiting to spring on me when I least expect it.

And then yesterday, in my kitchen, the same alarm went off. Could I hear it all the way from the garage?! This was harrowing. I tracked the sound down … to my watch.

The watch I bought a couple years ago. I needed to replace my simple watch that had a dial on the front, but this was on sale, and it had digits. Not to worry: it still told the time. And it came in purple.

When I went to Toronto, I had to advance the watch four time zones. I had to pull out the eensy-weensy instruction paper. Then I had to read the eensy-weensy writing on the eensy-weensy paper.

I had to get in Time Telling Mode and hold ‘A’ until seconds flashed, then press and hold ‘D.’ To get minutes and hours, I had to press ‘B,’ and then back to ‘D.’ There’s a little diagram that shows what ‘A’ and ‘B’ and ‘D’ are. Notice that they run counter-clockwise.

This is all very hard because ‘A’ and ‘B’ and ‘D’ are just little purple bumps along the edge of the watch. It’s hard to keep pressing without falling off the bumps, and if you hold, it “will advance digits rapidly.” That means you’ll pass your intended digit a few times and have to start the whole sequence over to set seconds then hours then minutes.

Needless to say, I have remained on Toronto time for four months rather than face my ‘A’s, ‘B’s, and ‘D’s again. My watch comes with a special Dual Time Zone Mode which should accommodate both Anchorage and somewhere else, but that involves pressing ‘B’ three times before getting to ‘A.’

Well, a couple weeks ago, I finally faced down the watch and moved myself from Toronto back to Anchorage. That must have been when I activated the alarm. The alarm gets set if I only press ‘B’ once: One ‘B’ = Alarm Mode; three ‘B’s = Time Telling Mode.

My watch can also clock my running time as a stopwatch. It can also do split times. It can also light up (but that involves ‘C.’) It can do all these things if it didn’t have me as the owner.

Yes, “when I am an old woman I shall wear purple,” but I’m just not sure that should apply to purple watches…. I just need to know the time.