Happy Christmas Annoying Al!

I have a radio alarm clock beside my bed. Most of us do. I call mine Annoying Al!

And therein lays the problem. He annoys the hell out of me!

That’s a bit of a shame because he is a faithful friend to me. If it wasn’t for Al I’d be late for work every morning. He gently wakes me up. He’s never ‘fashionably late’ unlike most of my house guests. No, he’s always bang on time. He doesn’t ask for anything in return and when it’s time for him to be quiet he leaves me in peace.

But I feel guilty. Guilty because I treat him appallingly. When he wakes me I invariably swear at him. It’s unfair I know. After all, I asked him to wake me and he’s carried out my request perfectly. Then I thump him! I bonk him on his snooze button and tell him to wake me in twenty minutes. Then I attack him again – and again - and again.

Just writing this down makes me feel awful. But I may as well admit to the worst piece of abuse I ever carried out on Al. One morning I threw him across the room. He clung on to his cable and although sitting upside-down in the corner he continued to try to calm me down with gentle music. But that just made me angrier! So I trod on him! Still he warbled. I admitted defeat. I turned him the right way up then noticed that I was thirty minutes late for a meeting. I’m sure he smiled. He was looking after me, and all I could do was to give him a beating for waking me up.

Al is beginning to look a little old. In dog years he’s about 77. But he continues to do his job calmly, quietly and with dignity. I recently purchased a replacement clock with the intention of pensioning Al off. But it still sits in its box. Quaking. And there it will sit for the foreseeable future!

So please remember your radio alarm this Christmas. On the big day he will be looking forward to letting you know that it’s time for the party to begin - the one day in the year he won’t get a beating or verbal abuse! Unfortunately, the chances are you’ll already be awake when he calls you. Probably not even in your bedroom. He’ll be all alone. Unloved and forgotten.

Happy Christmas Annoying Al.