The (Possible) Trojan Horse I Received from My Folks

Another gift I requested this year was a new clock radio. While I loved many things about my old one, the time setting mechanism was annoying. My old clock only let you set the time forward, meaning if I held the button for too long on accident and overshot my desired time, I could only continue going forward until I eventually came back to the time I wanted. I asked for one that had plus and minus buttons that would let me go forward and backward.

My husband did some online research and found a clock that met my request. (Pictured to the right.) When my parents asked him what they could get me for my birthday and Hanukkah, he suggested the clock to them. I received it in the mail when I got back from the DR.

The interesting thing about this clock is that it is something that Marshall might have invented for one of Sydney’s missions on Alias back when the show was still good. It has a special mechanism attached to it that allows it to receive signals from outer space (i.e. – satellites) that automatically sets the time. If there is a blackout, the second the power goes back on, the clock will contact outer space headquarters, find out what time it is, and reset itself. That’s pretty fucking cool, right? I think so.

When I found out that my clock had contacts outside my apartment, I was also a bit worried that it could be a spy clock. Not like in Alias, although it does strike me as exactly the type of thing they would plant in a room so that Dixon could monitor Sydney’s movements on a mission and warn her of danger. What if George Bush used my clock to spy on my anti-Bush activities? It’s not like his administration is above doing stuff like that. They won’t spend money on body army for soldiers in Iraq, but they would totally spend money to use outer space headquarters to spy on people through their clocks. Worse, they could always manipulate the satellite to send my clock the false time so that I am late to my anti-Bush activities, which really consist of bitching about their Evilness these days. It would screw me anyway, as I would be late to my do-gooder job, which is against their principles and they keep trying to de-fund anyway, and might make me not get tot the gym or social plans in a timely fashion. (In fact, I’m going to be late to the gym now since I am sitting here writing about my spy clock when I should be getting dressed.) Very destructive stuff. I’ll have to be very vigilant, or maybe I’m just looking a gift clock in the satellite.