The Curious Symbology of the Sick Old Clock

I'm not used to being ill. Right now I've got some untreatable viral crud that

• makes me cough uncontrollably like a sailor,
• makes my throat feel like the cats are using it as a scratching box
• makes snot run unaided out of my nostrils, over my lip and into my mouth.

"Drink lots of fluids and get plenty of rest" was the doctor's mantra.


Here are pictures of a clock in my office - it's a Micronta Timer, sold by Radio Shack - an electronic on and off box that I've had, oh, since the eighties.


I used it to turn on tape recorders and radio receivers automatically at precise times to record radio broadcasts I couldn't otherwise listen to. This was well before the Internet, back when local radio still had the occasional interesting bit.


Some time ago Mr. Micronta Timer started displaying time in new, creative ways. These pictures demonstrate the curious symbology if offers me.


There's no way to predict the display pattern It still seems to work because the time changes every minute just like a real clock, but it offers no meaning. It has become an abstract artist of temporal display, creating a little visual decoration in its old age with the limited means available to it.


This week, the clock also reminds me that, while I will recover from my illness, it won't. Maybe this will prompt me to finally throw it away. Assuming I ever get my normal level of energy back.


Notice several other unused relics of '80s office automation in the last picture: a Panasonic electric pencil sharpener and a Technics cassette dubbing deck, both of which still work if I ever care to use them - which, judging by the dust levels, is almost never.




Sick Old Tags: clock. . . electronic timer. . . Micronta. . . Radio Shack. . . electric pencil sharpener. . . illness. . . symbology