The Story of Clocky the Rolling Alarm Clock

I really don’t like getting out of bed.

I never have. Ever since I was a pre-pubescent, I’ve had this problem.

Lately, it’s gotten worse. Here I am, running my own business, with a staff of three to six to keep track of on any given day. And all I want to do is lay around in bed!

I’ve tried everything…it didn’t work to have the alarm clock across the room. I’d just get right back into bed, time and time again, even for as little as five minute snoozes.

An upbeat playlist backfired. It was too easy to shut off and go back to sweet slumber.

I even followed one blogger’s advice and practiced getting out of bed for a solid hour one night. I’d get set the alarm for two minutes later, get into bed, try to get into the sleeping rhythm and then — when the alarm went off — I’d practice jumping out of bed with energy and enthusiasm the way I dream I might. Time and time again I practiced. The next morning I went back to snoozing like nothing had happened.

Adorable Guster tucked into bed.

Can you blame me, when I have such an adorable feline beckoning me back to bed??

I’ve made the mornings incredibly easy for myself. The coffee pot goes off at 7:30 — the first thing I get to do is take a sip of nice, strong coffee. The boyfriend makes me breakfast. All I have to do is get my ass out of bed.

And I can’t do it.

One day I was shopping at fab.com and I found the answer: Clocky, the Rolling Alarm Clock.

This alarm clock is designed with people like me in mind. The alarm clock goes off and rolls away, so no matter how much I don’t want to, I have to go chase it.

Or so I thought.

Day 1

At long last, Clocky arrived in the mail. I was stoked. Tomorrow, I told myself, tomorrow will be the beginning of a new day!! I’ll get up early! I’ll exercise before work! I’ll come in so sun-shiney-happy that my team won’t know what hit them!

I set the alarm. I went to bed. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. It was a glorious sleep.

The next morning, the alarm goes off and Clocky takes off from his perch on my nightstand. Onto the floor he goes and boom! He’s stuck next to a stool.

Sleepy me reaches down out of bed, picks him up, presses snooze and back to dreamland. Fail. Though Clocky did succeed in scaring the wits out of poor Gus. But even that hilarity wasn’t enough to keep me from dreamland.

Day 2

Determined to make this work, I moved the offensive stool to give Clocky a clear path to somewhere hard to find. Tomorrow, by God, I will have to hunt and hunt to find this beeping, rolly creature. I will be awake!!

Moving the stool helped. Clocky rolled off and away. And then under the bed. I spent a solid two minutes fishing it out and was, indeed, awake. It was a success! The beginning of the new me!

Day 3

I did my best to ensure that the previous day’s success would reoccur. I cleared all obstacles from Clocky’s way. I went to bed. Oh, did it feel good to be a new person! To be someone with a working method to ensure that I got up early!! Ooooh, yes, the sky was the limit from now on.

But I neglected one thing: my intellect. Over the past two days I’d learned that there was a slight delay between when Clocky goes off and when he rolls off my nightstand. The next morning, he went off.

I acted quickly. I wrestled my hand from the covers, and in one quick gesture, pulled the drawer of my nightstand out. There Clocky was, a rolling and a beeping away in the confines of my nightstand drawer.

Another quick gesture later, he was silenced and I was back to sleep, happily dreaming of a time when I might actually learn to get up early.

Day 4

I had spent a whopping $30 or something on Clocky, and I wasn’t going to give up yet. Perhaps…perhaps, if I combine Clocky with the alarm-clock-across-the-room-method, perhaps then I would have the magic recipe to my new life!

Luckily for me, my boyfriend’s dresser was all way across the room and it had plenty of room for Clocky to live. That is until he woke up, and rolled away and I would finally get out of bed on time!

With a sense of dread, I placed him up there. Why dread, you ask? Well, I had an inkling that this method just might work, and, the truth of the matter was, I didn’t want to get out of bed on time. I wanted to lay around and cuddle until the last possible moment.

Well, I placed Clocky up there, and set the alarm. I went to bed, knowing that my slumber would be dramatically disturbed come 7:30 am. And come 7:30 am, it was. Clocky did his job, and did it well. It took me a solid five minutes to dig him out from under the chair he wound up under.

Reluctantly, I stayed awake.

The next few days continued to see Clocky doing his job and doing it well. But lucky for me, I had sabotaged the whole thing. You see, Clocky takes AAA batteries. And when he came, I couldn’t find my fresh AAA batteries. So I put in whatever ones I did find, and they just didn’t have much juice.

Day 16

Clocky is set atop the boyfriend’s dresser, waiting to do his job. But the sabotage finally worked its magic. By 7:30 am, Clocky was out of juice and unable to run around. I slept in unknowingly, yet happily. And I have yet to put new ones in.

What can I say? This damn rolly alarm clock just does too good a job. And I just plain don’t want to get out of bed.

Committed to getting out of bed? Get yourself a Clocky the Rolling Alarm Clock today!

Cheers

We’ve been watching Cheers on Netflix of late.

I’ve developed a strange desire to be…

1 half Norm

life on a bar stool, a beer in hand…nothing to do but shoot the shit with friends all day.

Norm from Cheers

and

1 half Diane’s Hair

symmetrical with lots of body, and always predictable.  That girl had a well-balanced hairdo. And that might just be a great model for life.

Diane from Cheers

The wp_postmeta Table is a Sexy Beast

The longer I work with WordPress, the more I love it. There’s something about knowing something so inside and out that makes you all the more fond of it.

The farther I dig into custom themes, post types, design…the more I have started having to get down and dirty with the actual MySQL database where all the content for a WordPress website is stored.

It gets super geeky, and there’s no need to go into any level of detail. But this sort of detail-oriented digging tends to make one punchy…which led to this:

I just imagined the two of us in a sordid love triangle…I’m calling my boyfriend, “oooh I have to stay late…I haven’t gotten this functionality to work.” Meanwhile the wp_postmeta table is kissing my neck and massaging my back. I’m digging in deeper to find the slug for the custom data I need displayed…he’s asking me on a ski weekend.

What did I tell you? Punchy.

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School’s cool. I get to see all my friends and I get to socialize. I don’t even mind the tests.

As you can see, I’ve trid to write before. But I’ve just been too busy. There has been a lot going on. So, I’ll start at the beginning of the mad rush of stuff. Last Friday night – the 3rd was Nikki N’s party. I wasn’t sure if I was going to go to it because she’s a rocker and I’m not. But I went and I danced with her brother, he’s in 6th grade – named Ricky 4 times. I danced 3 slow and 1 fast as well as 2 slow with other peoples.

I was really uncomfortable for most of the party. Melissa L. kept telling me to ask Ricky out. Now Ricky is sweet but he’s ugly and annoying. I didn’t want to go out with him. But I survived that evening.

On Saturday I signed up for the future stars competition which is taking place tomorrow! I’m soooooo nervous!

Nothing happened on Sunday, I think. I was afraid Ricky would ask me out on Mon but he didn’t.

Nothing happened Tues but Wed. was the band concert! We played Canto and I had to play the gong! I only missed two gongs! I’m so happy and proud of myself. After the concert, Jordan talked to me, and it was like I had been accepted into their little circle. Not completely but on Thurs Jordan bopped me on the head with his rolled up poster. I can see why Emily likes him but I could never.

I’m afraid I am starting to like Andy (AGAIN!) I don’t know. It was like Wed. or Thurs. and he was coming up to our row in Science. He sit next to Lina. Anyway our eyes met and it was really wierd. In that second I got this feeling that I like him. I haven’t been able to shake that feeling, try as I might. Fri night I went camping so I had to miss my skating lessons on Sat. But I sat, starring at the starry sky, trying to short my thoughts and feelings. I haven’t figured out my feelings yet. I know it’s stupid to like a guy in the happy group because I don’t have a chance with them.

On Fri, Nikki in PE told me that Rikky wanted to go out w/ me. In French, I told Nikki that I wouldn’t. I know I made the right decision because I don’t like him, but this was a chance for me to finally have a boyfriend. I know that guys can like me, because he asked me out.

At the awards ceremony for Band, Fri. afternoon, Andy won for best lashes and he got a tube of mascara. And he does have the best lashes. They’re long and thick and gorgeous! They belong on a girl. But I can’t like him! I’m tired of liking guys I don’t have a chance with. But he is single. I could ask him out but that would be stupid. I just need to sort out my feelings for him. He’s nice though. Annoying but nice. He’s always singing, and, oh, his lashes are wonderful! But I already talked about those.

I’m soooooooo infinity os nervous! I can’t believe the competition is tomorrow! I want to win soooo bad! But I’m up against this one girl that I saw at the rink today. She’s in my class, and she’s halla good. All I can hope is that I’m not giving myself enough credit or that she falls flat on her butt. I’m also up against this sucky girl, so I can at least beat her. I hope! Please, God, help me! I want to win sooooooo bad! And I will. I choose my divine blueprint.

I really don’t want school to end. When school ends then I’m stuck alone in summer. School’s cool. I get to see all my friends and I get to socialize. I don’t even mind the tests. I wish it didn’t have to end. It’s amazing that it has been almost a year since Becky has moved. The end of the year brings back so many memories of her. I wish she hadn’t moved.

So far there is only one cuss word in it and hell’s a place not a thing.

I’ve been busy. I can’t seem to stop writing this book- I think I’ll actually do it this time. I’m going to get it published and everything. I can’t figure out what the title should be though. Today I gave lots of people copies of it so they could edit it. I haven’t made any of the changes yet- but it’s like they’re adopting my story. I might as well say it’s by Jennifer Hellers friends. I know i really need their input and believe I apreciate- but I’m not going to change a lot. I’ll think about what they think and if they think one part sucks I’ll improve it. But I’m not adding anything that isn’t my own words. So far there is only one cuss word in it and hell’s a place not a thing.

Ciao! (Chow!)

It was so NIFTY! That’s our new word! Boy am I tired.

Today was the GATE trip to the tidepools. It was cool but I’m SO tired! We had to be at school at 3:30 AM! I had a wee bit of trouble getting up. We left the school about 5 to 4 and arrived in Half Moon Bay about 5 or so. I was in the same group as Ana. We went out to the kelp covered rocks and slipped and slided around looking for marine life. My feet were so cold…I swear I was afraid of frost bite. By the end of the tidepooling part of the field trip I was up to my knees in water. The bottom half of my legs was numb. Swear it took hours afterwards to get the feeling back into them. A group of us me, Ana, Natalie, Katie, Pat S., and Chris B. built a total nifty sand castle. It was so NIFTY! That’s our new word! Boy am I tired. I can hardly believe it was this morning that we left. It feels like days ago.

You will never believe what I’m doing. I’m on chapter 4 but I think I need to lengthen the chapters. It started out being a