I Don't Have Time For This

"What time is it?"

A simple question that used to have a simple answer.

  • Look at watch or clock
  • Done

Violent abuse of Moore's Law has changed this up a bit.

  • Look at smartphone.
  • Check office and personal email while you're at it.
  • Also check to-do list and calendar.
  • Suddenly remember that you forgot to tell someone at the office something important.
  • Call office.
  • Notice Mother's number in the quick dial list and realize you haven't called in weeks.
  • Call Mom.
  • Call customer to answer question asked in another glanced at email because hammering out a email response with your thumb is a royal pain.
  • Remote into a server to see why it sent you the panicked email you glanced at before making all the damned calls.
  • Become aware of the passage of large chunks of time.
  • Ask self, "What time is it?"

To break this cycle, I dug out two of my watches. Both had dead batteries and thus were taken to a jeweler to have new ones installed.

The results of this trip will not be chronicled. Suffice it to say, it was a mistake1

One fifteen minute visit to Amazon followed by two day's shipping and handling later, I am wearing a Seiko Kinetic. No winding. No battery replacement. No, "I'm at work 24/7", rabbit hole.

And I couldn't be happier.


  1. I now have a Mondaine I need to take to a real jeweler to have the backplate reattached. Fortunately, the air-headed eye-candy staffing the place was outsmarted by the Seiko and it managed to escape it's companion's fate.