Get your head outta the gutter, yo! ‘Tain’t those kind of vibrations. Oh no. ‘Tis a far, far more loathsome kind: The vibrating alarm.
Never did I ever think this would be a No Dankes! topic. Who would?
I suppose I am partly to blame. Shame on me for getting too familiar with a vibrating wake up call. But you see, a few months ago my regular radio alarm failed to go off. And I failed to wake up. Hence, failed to make it to work by 9 o’clock. Unacceptable!
Enter: iPhone. Each and every night since that most fateful morn, I’ve set myself two alarms. Clock radio and iPhone.
Now. I abhor phones dinging every time a text arrives. To abate any contribution of text-arrival-noise-pollution, I set my cell exclusively to vibrate. Same thing for phone calls. And so that sadly translates into alarm clocks, too.When my very own Apple brand Bell Tower starts chiming at 8:12 a.m., it also starts vibrating (such a multitasker, that iPhone!) This vibrating buzz-iness can be pretty goddamn loud, especially when your ears (like mine) are super sensitive.
You know how those perfumery peeps are called “Noses”? Well if I were known by a sense, my spectacular nickname would be “Ears”.
Whew, that was a long-winded introduction – alas I suppose you’ve grown to expect that from me…otherwise why are you reading this?
day, I didn’t go out boozing Friday night. Thus I was enjoying a superpower-sober-sleep Saturday morning – not passed the hell out as usual while my body worked through its surplus of barley and hops.
Because of this, my sleep was a far cry from any sort of R.E.M. My snooze was so light, I daresay even a quiet breath could have awoken me. But there were no breaths. No loud music. No car alarms, even. Nope. What did, in fact, wake me up was nothing other than someone else’s phone alarm vibrating. Yup.
At 6 a.m. on the dot, I was awakened by a nasty bout of incessant, repetitive, alarmingly loud (well, to my sensitive ears at least) alarm clock vibrations. Like the phone was just chillin on the floor next door and it wanted to send its signals through the wooden floorboards to torture me. The worst part is, I don’t even know if it was on the floor. It was somewhere. I heard its buzz through walls, through concrete, through brick – I couldn’t for the life of me figure out where it was coming from.There I was, tossing and turning, with a phantom vibration annoying the bejesus out of me. 6:16, :26, :36, :46. I was sleepily wide awake.
For an HOUR it went off. And worst of all, the vibrations weren’t even. They suffered from some sort of arrhythmia. No joke! They were all over the place. Sure, they occurred every other second or so, but to my sleep-addled-perfectionist mind they were unbearably unsymmetrical. I walked down in the hall in my nightgown and sleep mask. I stomped on the floor and banged on the walls and ceiling. I ate canned frosting with my finger out of sheer frustration.
I was beyond stressed and depressed and tired and pissed. I felt like Ingrid Bergman in Gaslight, like people were slowly and methodically trying to drive me mad. Except I’m no actress and my sober Saturday morning was no movie.
I sandwiched my head between two pillows, turned my air conditioner on high. I screamed as loud as I possibly good to TURN THE ALARM OFF. I cried. I was actually happy when I heard the garbage trucks rolling down the street. Anything to distract my ears from the interminable whirring that was occurring somewhere thisclose. But where, I did not know.The arrhythmia confused me, tricked me into thinking it was finished. I got pumped when the vibrations skipped a few beats, I could drift peacefully off to sleep for an hour before my movie marathon! But no. Then they started up again.
One. Full. Hour. Later. They stopped completely. My sanity was barely salvaged. If these cruel and unusual vibrations find their way to my ears anytime soon, I don’t know what will happen.
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