It's just a plain ole’ desk clock with a silver
colored plastic body, a bright face, big numbers you can read from across the
room and a cheap quartz movement. Lately, it's been behaving oddly.
Some days it loses five minutes. Some days
it gains back the time, or some of it then loses it again. Quartz clocks
generally gain time when the battery is low. That's counterintuitive, but
it's true.
This calls for an
investigation. Ask Google. Ask Quora. Ask Siri, Alexa, Cortana.
Dear Abby. No one has an answer, though surely one exists.
Several battery changes
later, the clock is doing the same routine. So the only possible explanation is
it’s haunted. And why would some ghost park itself in a cheap quartz movement?
Why it’s sending a
message, of course. But what message, and why this clock? Is that grandpa
sending word about something that happened in 1912? Is it some random dead guy
in Nepal sending a test message just because he can? Or he needed a practice
session?
So what’s in order here
is a seance. We were seated around the table and successfully contacted
Leroy Anderson. He yelled at us: “I only know about syncopated
clocks! What’s quartz?”
Next on our list was
Henry Work. Another success. But
he stormed “All I know about is My Grandfather’s clock.” This was getting
us nowhere.
Before we ended the
seance some ghost showed up claiming to be Seth Thomas. He berated us,
too by stomping his ghostly foot and telling us “S*it like this doesn’t happen
with a REAL clock. Quartz is for the birds. Gears! Springs! TICK TOCK!”
Since Mr. Thomas died in
1859, we just wrote him off as a cranky old man time passed by.
The quartz clock was
invented in 1927 (not a typo) by two scientists at Bell Labs. We
investigated their adventures and all that resulted was confirmation that human
wrecking ball Carly Fiorina destroyed what was left of it after the breakup of
the original AT&T.
SHRAPNEL:
--The owners of Dollar
Tree and Dollar General say they plan to start selling alcoholic drinks in 1000
of their stores. What kind of shot bottle will you get for a buck? Maybe ten-minute old Scotch or bourbon, and
rice wine.
--If ever you considered
not having medical insurance, consider this. The hospital bill for a recent
hernia operation was close to $30,000. And neither the surgeon nor the
anesthesiologist has billed yet.
--The anesthesiologist
was a nice-looking young woman. At least I think she was nice looking.
But I don’t remember a thing after putting on the mask.
GRAPESHOT:
-Do not believe the myth
that a good surgeon can tie a knot with one hand, though the surgeon in this
surgery was a guy who everyone --everyone -- including your correspondent likes
and respects.
-Mark “Mark the knife”
Armstrong, you are a prince among men and I will adore you at least until your
bill arrives.
I’m Wes Richards. My
opinions are my own but you’re welcome to them. ®
© WJR 2019
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