Alarm Clocks Quotes

The day that changed my life was one of those days. The crappy kind.

Normal people have a whole lot of them.

It starts when I open my eyes - forty minutes later than I'm supposed to. Stupid alarm clock. It should know I mean a.m. Who the hell needs to wake up at four p.m.? No one, that's who. Forget about self-driving cars; Google needs to move their asses on self-aware alarm clocks. ~ Emma Chase

It was an impressive achievement, of course, and a human achievement by the members of the IBM team, but Deep Blue was only intelligent the way your programmable alarm clock is intelligent. Not that losing to a $10 million alarm clock made me feel any better. ~ Garry Kasparov

Alarm clocks were invented by fork-tongued devils disguised as gremlins wearing snake masks. ~ Amy Kathleen Ryan

Postal inspectors have been given advanced warning that Publishers Clearinghouse is sending packets of laundry detergent that could be mistaken for anthrax. Oh, good timing. What genius came up with this promotion? What's next - a ticking alarm clock? Let's put that in a box. ~ Jay Leno

Everybody I hang with - the ranchers, the farmers, the cops, the teachers, the plumbers, everybody I hang with - they've got an alarm clock. They get up, they put their heart and their soul into being the very best that they can be. They want to be an asset to their families and their neighborhood. They want to be productive members of society. ~ Ted Nugent

You will find the key to success under the alarm clock. ~ Benjamin Franklin

The alarm in the morning? Well, I have an old tape of Carlo Maria Giulini conducting the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra in a perfectly transcendent version in Shubert's seventh symphony. And I've rigged it up so that at exactly 7:30 every morning it falls from the ceiling onto my face. ~ Stephen Fry

Alarm clocks were going off in the city now. One after another, sometimes two or three together, they drove their small silver knives into the body of the great dream that sprawled naked on the housetops. Sensual, amiable, and defenseless as it was, it would still take a little while to die. ~ Peter S. Beagle

People went to bed when the sun went down and they woke up when the sun came up. That's what our bodies are naturally programmed to do. However, with all the new stresses in life with electricity, with technology, we tend to override that system and we'll stay up later and we'll get up earlier or later, and we use alarm clocks, we use the light. ~ Shelby Harris

cozy+smell of pancakes-alarm clock=weekend ~ Amy Krouse Rosenthal

I saw something stupid in the paper today. A new alarm clock that makes no noise. It's for people who don't like loud noises. Instead, it slowly hits you with light and gets brighter and brighter until you wake up. I already have one of those.. it's called a window. ~ Jay Leno

I once compiled a list of events that frightened her, and it was quite comprehensive: very loud snoring; low-flying aircraft; church bells; fire engines; trains; buses and lorries; thunder; shouting; large cars; most medium-sized cars; noisy small cars; burglar alarms; fireworks, especially crackers; loud radios; barking dogs; whinnying horses; nearby silent horses; cows in general; megaphones; sheep; corks coming out of sparkling wine bottles; motorcycles, even very small ones; balloons being popped; vacuum cleaners (not being used by her); things being dropped; dinner gongs; parrot houses; whoopee cushions; chiming doorbells; hammering; bombs; hooters; old-fashioned alarm clocks; pneumatic drills; and hairdryers (even those used by her). ~ John Cleese

Tip #2: No more alarm clocks ~ Mary Helen Conroy

I asked, "Why were you crying?"
But she didn't answer, because I hadn't said it out loud.
The truth was that I was too grateful for her presence here at all to push my luck by asking questions that might frighten her away. So I babbled to her about my classes and the foibles of Paul and Doritos as alarm clocks, and I was completely flippant and funny and even as she began to laugh, I was dying with wanting. ~ Maggie Stiefvater

Alarm clocks, I felt, were nothing more than a plague rained down by an evil force, possibly even Lucifer himself. ~ Bart Hopkins

A built-in reminder is the simple understanding that whenever any kind of unhappiness arises, you know you've lost the now. That's a built-in alarm clock. The moment you realize you've lost the now, come back to the now. ~ Eckhart Tolle

I won't tell you how many hours a day I work because you wouldn't believe it. But don't worry; I am in bed at 11 p.m., sleep well and get up early, without an alarm clock. ~ Michel Ocelot

Where every day doesn't start with an alarm clock and end with the television. ~ Chuck Palahniuk

I wake up at about the same time every day. I sleep well and wake without an alarm clock. ~ Donatella Versace

Most of us, myself included, have forgotten what real darkness is like. We live in a world where light is inescapable. It comes from street lamps, headlights, security floodlights, and even the faint glow of our alarm clocks. ~ Jake Halpern

I like things that are simple, such as an alarm clock. ~ Martin Freeman

I took a walk on the cool sand dunes, brittle grass overgrown, and above me, in the night sky, above me, I saw. Bitter taste of unripe peaches and a smell I could not place, nor could I escape. I remembered other times that I could not escape. I remembered other smells. The moon slunk like a wounded animal. The world spun like it had lost control. Concentrate only on breathing and let go of ideas you had about nutrition and alarm clocks. I took a walk on the cool sand dunes, brittle grass overgrown, and above me, in the night sky, above me, I saw.
This message brought to you by Coca-Cola. ~ Joseph Fink

As a performer, I wanted to be the loudest, most persistent alarm clock I could be, because there didn't seem like any other way to snap society out of its Christianity- and media-induced coma. ~ Marilyn Manson

(On differences between men and boys) Men know what they want. Men make concrete plans. Men own alarm clocks. Men sleep on a mattress that isn't on the floor. Men tip generously. Men buy new shampoo instead of adding water to a nearly empty bottle of shampoo. Men go to the dentist. Men make reservations. Men go in for a kiss without giving you some long preamble about how they're thinking of kissing you. Men wear clothes that have never been worn by anyone else before. ~ Mindy Kaling

Men know what they want. Men make concrete plans. Men own alarm clocks. Men sleep on a mattress that isn't on the floor. Men tip generously. Men buy new shampoo instead of adding water to a nearly empty bottle of shampoo. Men go to the dentist. Men make reservations. Men go in for a kiss without giving you some long preamble about how they're thinking of kissing you. Men wear clothes that have never been worn by anyone else before. (Okay, maybe men aren't exactly like this. This is what I've cobbled together from the handful of men I know or know of, ranging from Heathcliff Huxtable to Theodore Roosevelt to my dad.) Men know what they want and they don't let you in on their inner monologue, and that is scary. ~ Mindy Kaling

Neil McNair has become my alarm clock, if alarm clocks had
freckles and knew all your insecurities. ~ Rachel Lynn Solomon

Breakthroughs in information and communications technology are leading to forms of dematerialization unimaginable just a decade ago. Consider smartphones. They require more energy to manufacture and operate than older cell phones. But by obviating the need for separate, physical newspapers, books, magazines, cameras, watches, alarm clocks, GPS systems, maps, letters, calendars, address books, and stereos, they will likely significantly reduce humanity's use of energy and materials over the next century. Such examples suggest that holding technological progress back could do far more environmental damage than accelerating it. ~ Michael Shellenberger

Ho threw their watches off the roof to cast their ballot for an Eternity outside of Time, and alarm clocks fell on their heads every day for the next decade,
who cut their wrists three times successively unsuccessfully, gave up and were forced to open antique stores where they thought they were growing old and cried,
who were burned alive in their innocent flannel suits on Madison Avenue amid blasts of leaden verse and the tanked-up clatter of the iron regiments of fashion and the nitroglycerine shrieks of the fairies of advertising and the mustard gas of sinister intelligent editors, or were run down by the drunken taxicabs of Absolute Reality.. ~ Allen Ginsberg

I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked, dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of the night. ~ Allen Ginsberg

Alarm clocks are the bane of humanity. Sleep inertia, the decline in motor dexterity, subjective feeling of grogginess, and impaired state of awareness and mental performance is normal after awakening from even a light sleep. Scientific studies reveal that abruptly awakening from a deep sleep amplifies the severity and duration of sleep inertia. ~ Kilroy J. Oldster

All my life I have battled the alarm clock, pummeling the snooze button over and over with mounting self-loathing until the shame is finally strong enough to lever me upright. ~ Isaac Marion

Instead of things I'm good at, it might be faster to list the things I can't do. I can't cook or clean the house. My room's a mess, and I'm always losing things. I love music, but I can't sing a note. I'm clumsy and can barely sew a stitch. My sense of direction is the pits, and I can't tell left from right half the time. When I get angry, I tend to break things. Plates and pencils, alarm clocks. Later on I regret it, but at the time I can't help myself. I have no money in the bank. I'm bashful for no reason, and I have hardly any friends to speak of. ~ Haruki Murakami

I often set two alarm clocks because I'm afraid the first one won't actually make me get up. ~ Kurt Andersen

The ads have also helped manufacture a sense of panic about time, depicting families so rushed and harried in the morning that there is no time to make breakfast, not even to pour some milk over a bowl of cereal. No, the only hope is to munch on a cereal bar (iced with synthetic "milk" frosting) in the bus or car. (Tell me: Why can't these hassled families set their alarm clocks, like, ten minutes earlier?!) ~ Michael Pollan

Who needs an alarm clock you you have a bladder ~ T. Haque

Most of all, however, critics of black conservatives say we've forgotten where we came from. I may forget a federal budget number or, God forbid, to set the alarm clock for my weekly 6 a.m. flight to Washington, but I know exactly where I came from. ~ J. C. Watts

My alarm clock during my childhood was a pride of lions. ~ Yann Martel

I collect travel alarm clocks. I was in a flea market in France once, in 1994, and I opened up this beautiful Jaeger-LeCoultre folding eight-day winding clock folded into a beautiful case, and I went, 'Wow, man.' And I've been collecting travel alarm clocks since 1994. ~ Alec Baldwin

The most disturbing sound in the world comes from the alarm clock at 5:30am ~ Munia Khan

Disasters work like alarm clocks to the world, hence God allows them. They are shouting, 'Wake up! Love! Pray! ~ Criss Jami

Orma had given me a timepiece that emitted blasphemy-inducing chirps at whatever early hour I specified. ~ Rachel Hartman

Major power and telephone grids have long been controlled by computer networks, but now similar systems are embedded in such mundane objects as electric meters, alarm clocks, home refrigerators and thermostats, video cameras, bathroom scales, and Christmas-tree lights - all of which are, or soon will be, accessible remotely. ~ Charles C. Mann

I don't need an alarm clock, for habit is the best alarm there is. ~ Jane Stanton Hitchcock

It's a cold summer morning with the dawn chorus in full swing. The sun is beginning to rise above still-sleepy London town. People stir in their beds, hoping that it is not yet time to get up, wishing for a few more minutes of peace. They cling onto loved ones, feel their warmth and try to settle back to sleep whilst alarm clocks limber up, getting ready to play their tunes. ~ Ross Lennon

Make Believe

When I wake up in the morning
Not all is what it seems
I drift through a world of make believe
Between my real life and my dreams.

Strange Adventures from the space book
That I read the night before
Crowd in upon on my drowsiness
Through imagination's door.

Between sleeping and waking
The alarm clock's jangalang cry
Becomes the roaring fire-railed rocket
That hurls me through the sky.

My bed's a silver spacecraft
Which I pilot all alone
Whisp'ring through endless stratospheres
Towards planets still unknown.

Outside through the mists of morning
The spinning lights of cars
In my make-believe space voyage
Become eternities of stars.

Is that my mother calling something
That my dreams can't understand?
Or can it be crackling instructions
From far off Mission Command?

Gareth Owen ~ John Foster

A finely carved Black Forest cuckoo clock hung just to the right of the hutch. Phil would love that, Reuben thought. Phil had once collected cuckoo clocks, and their constant chiming and tweeting and cooing had driven everybody at home a little nuts. ~ Anne Rice

It works far better," Jane went on, apparently still intent on berating him, "when you trust those people with the truth. When you give them all the facts."
Her tone put him on the defensive. "You mean, the way you did when you told me about Nancy's disappearance?"
Jane paled. "Well…that was different."
"How so?" He approached her with a scowl. "You left out the important fact that she might be pregnant. If I'd known, we would all have left for York as soon as Tristan could join us, and we wouldn't have wasted so much time."
Her throat moved convulsively. "You can't blame me for that. I was protecting Nancy."
"And all those years ago, I was protecting you," he said fiercely. He took another step toward her. "I know you resent how I manipulated you into jilting me, but my damned brother had just torn my family apart, and I wasn't sure what lay ahead of me. I couldn't bear to watch your love for me die in the slums of London."
"So you killed it instead?" she choked out.
His heart faltered. "Did I?"
Alarm spread over her face. Then she turned, as if to flee.
He grabbed her arm to tug her up close to him. She wouldn't look at him, which only inflamed him more. "I answered your questions," he rasped. "Now answer mine."
He could feel her tremble, see uncertainty flash over her face in profile. Utter silence reigned in the room. Even the servants had apparently finished in the dining room across the hall, for no sound penetrated thei ~ Sabrina Jeffries

Who needs a bladder when you need an alarm clock ~ T. Haque

She begged for time to stop, for clocks to break, for every star to remain fixed. But none of that happened. ~ Alice Hoffman

That's our cue to depart."
"They know something " I pointed out.
"I know something too. I know we're going to attract a lot of unwanted attention if they keep screaming. And then we have to make up some ridiculous explanation about how we heard screaming through the vents in our rooms and we followed the sound back to the basement and we found these girls lying on the ground and pretending to be tied up by invisible rope because they're practicing for the regional mime championships."
I blinked at her. "Is that explanation more or less believable than we woke up because two girls who are actually evil magicians tripped a magical alarm wired to a door in the basement we aren't supposed to know about "
Scout paused for a minute then nodded. "Point made. ~ Chloe Neill

I could list more excuses, but a mind that is set against accomplishing its goals will always have a fresh one close at hand. Instead, I'll give you first step: set your morning alarm one hour earlier. Devote that hour to your dreams. Rip out the snooze button. Know you will sleep all the better when your project is done. Think I'm kidding? Think this is just a clever way to start a book? ~ Terry Fletcher

I feel like I'm late for love. I'll be 30 in March. Damn it! I knew I should have set my alarm clock. ~ Jarod Kintz

We've already seen digital picture frames pre-loaded with viruses; I'm not eager to have my refrigerator hacked or my alarm clock turned against me. ~ Jamais Cascio

My radio's loud like a fire alarm:
The floor vibrates, the walls cave in,
The bass makes my eardrums seem thin.
Def sounds in my ride, yes the front and back ...
You would think it was a party, not a Cadillac! ~ LL Cool J

But, Princess Leia!" C-3PO's voice rose in alarm. "You can't! The mission sounds terribly dangerous." "Threepio, in the quarter century you've served me, have you ever known me to run away from danger?" "Well. No." The droid considered this a moment before adding hopefully, "Yet you might eventually develop a stronger instinct for survival." Leia couldn't help laughing. "Don't count on it. ~ Claudia Gray

how from time to time some young and beautiful nun had suddenly disappeared, to the surprise and alarm of her companions; how piercing shrieks had been heard to issue from the interior of the building, by those who passed near it at night, - and how the inmates themselves were often aroused from their slumbers by strange noises resembling the rattling of chains, the working of ponderous machinery, and the revolution of huge wheels. ~ George W.M. Reynolds

The Lord made no better clock than a child, and none more bitter. Oh, what beautiful clocks they are. ~ Vincent Louis Carrella

Humans abstract and record information in five major ways: with writing, mathematical notation, painting/photography/videography, maps, and clocks - that is, we can abstract and record verbal, numerical, visual, spatial, and temporal information. ~ William J. Bernstein

It is impossible indeed not to look with considerable uneasiness at the type of the "modern economist" as he developed after Keynes' revolutionary book, whom Keynes himself regarded with alarm at the end of his days. It is the type of man who is obsessed by one thing, i.e. "effective demand," which he thinks must be kept up at whatever cost,
while he forgets the working of the mechanism of prices, wages, interest and exchange rates. ~ Wilhelm Ropke

Juliet knew that, to many people, she might seem to be odd and solitary - and so, in a way, she was. But she had also had the experience, for much of her life, of feeling surrounded by people who wanted to drain away her attention and her time and her soul. And usually, she let them. Be available, be friendly (especially if you are not popular) - that was what you learned in a small town and also in a girls' dormitory. Be accommodating to anybody who wants to suck you dry, even if they know nothing about who you are. She looked straight at this man and did not smile. He saw her resolve, there was a twitch of alarm in his face. ~ Alice Munro

Do not give way to useless alarm; though it is right to be prepared for the worst, there is no occasion to look on it as certain. ~ Jane Austen

My roses are my jewels; the sun, moon, and stars my clocks; fruit and water my fare. ~ Lady Hester Stanhope

That red spot!" she says with alarm.
"That's a freckle!"
"It wasn't there before ... " she says as she inspects her entire arm.
"It's cute."
"It's not cute."
"Then it's mine," I say. "If you don't like it, it's mine. I'll call it Brady."
"My freckle?"
"Yes."
"You're naming my freckle after yourself?" she says. "And you think I have issues?"
"It's like a star. People buy stars in the constellation and name them after people al the time. As gifts."
"So then are you buying my freckle? Because I don't know if you can afford my freckle. My freckles don't come cheap, you know."
"I've already claimed it," I declare. "It's not up for discussion anymore. Just eat your ice cream. And don't spill any on Brady. ~ Caprice Crane

He selected one of these incantations and began to chant in a loud, wailing voice. All the clocks in the house suddenly went off at once, though it was only three-twenty; the copper pots hanging in the kitchen clanged and whanged against each other; and a couple of the wizard's books fell off their shelves with a clump. But nothing else happened. Prospero slammed the magic book shut and slumped into an overstuffed chair. He fumbled in his smoking stand for his pipe and tobacco. "I learned that spell fifty years ago," he mumbled as he lit his pipe. "And I still don't know what it's for. ~ John Bellairs

A merry little surge of electricity piped by automatic alarm from the mood organ beside his bed awakened Rick Deckard. ~ Philip K. Dick

No Alarm Clock Needed. My Passion Wakes Me. ~ Eric Thomas

On a construction site sabotage could be potentially deadly. Alarm jumped through her. "Is anyone hurt?"
"No, thankfully. But… I need to be there."
"Then go. I've got my communicator and everyone knows I'm yours now anyway." She liked saying that she was his. He liked it as well if the smoldering look he gave her was any indication.
As the elevator made a soft ding, she leaned up and kissed him, not caring about the public affection. He didn't seem to mind either as he deepened the kiss for a little longer than was probably publicly acceptable.
When the doors opened, there were two males inside who didn't appear to be getting off - until Con growled at them. Without pause, they politely stepped off and let her get on. Even though there was enough room for about twenty warriors, apparently Con was feeling extra protective today.
She bit back a smile and blew him a kiss goodbye in full view of the two males. To her surprise his ears tinged red.
It was the last thing she saw before the doors closed. A short laugh escaped as she pressed the correct floor. ~ Savannah Stuart

In the end, we all want a wife. But the home has become increasingly invaded by the ethos of work, work, work, with twin sets of external clocks imposed on a household's natural rhythms. ~ Sandra Tsing Loh

(Antique clocks) need servicing just like your automobile or anything else. They're mechanical, and about every 10 years you should have them cleaned. That's the way they last forever. ~ William Baldwin

I've always been fascinated by the Chinese. This goes a long way back to my childhood. The Chinese invented money, movable type, clocks, and built the largest ships in the history of the world. ~ Thomas Steinbeck

Thursday morning. I usually let my Mum wake me up but today I have set my alarm for seven. Even from under my duvet, I can hear it bleating on the other side of my room. I hid it inside my plastic crate for faulty joysticks so that I would have to get out of bed, walk across the room, yank it out of the box by its lead and, only then, jab the snooze button. This was a tactical manoeuvre by my previous self. He can be very cruel. ~ Joe Dunthorne

I kept climbing
past another telkhine, who was so startled he dropped his Lil' Demons lunch box. I left him alive
partly because his lunch box was cool, partly so he could raise the alarm and hopefully get his friends to follow me rather than head toward the engine room. ~ Rick Riordan

Oh, if it were lawful for men, in order to raise their opinions on horseback, to use the Scripture as stirrups, to lengthen and shorten them, each one to his own size, where, I beg you, should we be? Do you not perceive the stratagem? All authority is taken away from tradition, the Church, the Councils, the pastors: what further remains? The Scripture. The enemy is crafty. If he would tear it all away at once he would cause an alarm; he takes away a great part of it in the very beginning, then first one piece, then the other, at last he will have you stripped entirely, without Scripture and without Word of God. ~ Francis De Sales

And if you'd swap your metalife for a bone clock's snatched, wasted, tawdry handful of decades! ~ David Mitchell

I've now come to realize that getting excited about a suspect is a lot like that first surge of stupid love in a relationship, in which, despite vague alarm bells, you plow forward convinced that he is the One. ~ Michelle McNamara

Many things they sawe with us as mathematicall instruments, sea compasses ... spring clocks that seemed to goe of themselves - and many other things we had - were so strange unto them, and so farre exceeded their capacities to comprehend the reason and meanes how they should be made and done, that they thought they were rather the workes of gods then men. ~ Thomas Harriot

The alarm rings 4:45, again at 5, but I wake up 4:30 naturally. Shower, shave, orange juice, perk my own coffee, hear the news, and the CBS car arrives 5:30. ~ Charlie Rose

EVERY WEDNESDAY, I teach an introductory fiction workshop at Harvard University, and on the first day of class I pass out a bullet-pointed list of things the students should try hard to avoid. Don't start a story with an alarm clock going off. Don't end a story with the whole shebang having been a suicide note. Don't use flashy dialogue tags like intoned or queried or, God forbid, ejaculated. Twelve unbearably gifted students are sitting around the table, and they appreciate having such perimeters established. With each variable the list isolates, their imaginations soar higher. They smile and nod. The mood in the room is congenial, almost festive with learning. I feel like a very effective teacher; I can practically hear my course-evaluation scores hitting the roof. Then, when the students reach the last point on the list, the mood shifts. Some of them squint at the words as if their vision has gone blurry; others ask their neighbors for clarification. The neighbor will shake her head, looking pale and dejected, as if the last point confirms that she should have opted for that aseptic-surgery class where you operate on a fetal pig. The last point is: Don't Write What You Know.

The idea panics them for two reasons. First, like all writers, the students have been encouraged, explicitly or implicitly, for as long as they can remember, to write what they know, so the prospect of abandoning that approach now is disorienting. Second, they know an awful lot. In recent wo ~ Bret Anthony Johnston

The alarm bells shriek again, echoing off the walls. "The hell is that?" asks Tattoo. "And why does it keep going off?" "There's some crazy lady on the loose," says Doc. "Keeps propping open emergency exits. Triggers the alarm. Are you going to let me go?" Well, at least my mom must be doing okay. ~ Susan Ee

How did you find me?"
"I've followed you for a long time." He must have mistaken the look on my face for alarm or fear, and said, "Not literally. I just mean I never lost track."
But it wasn't fear, or anything like that. It was an instant of realization I'd have a lot in the coming days: I'd been thinking of him as coming back from the dead, but the fact was he'd been there all along. He'd been alive when I cried in my room over him being gone. He'd been alive when I started a new school without him, the day I made my first friend a Jones Hall, the time I ran into Ethan at the library. Cameron Quick and I had existed simultaneously on the planet during all of those moments. It didn't seem possible that we could have been leading separate lives, not after everything we'd been through together.
"...then I looked you up online," he was saying, "and found your mom's wedding announcement from before you changed your name. I didn't even need to do that. It's easy to find someone you never lost."
I struggled to understand what he was saying. "You mean...you could have written to me, or seen me, sooner?"
"I wanted to. Almost did, a bunch of times."
"Why didn't you? I wish you had." And I did, I wished it so much, imagined how it would have been to know all those years that he was there, thinking of me.
"Things seemed different for you," he said, matter-of-fact. "Better. I could tell that from the bits of information I found...like an interview with ~ Sara Zarr

Few in these hot, dim, strenuous times are quite sane or free; choked with care like clocks full of dust, laboriously doing so much good and making so much money - or so little, they are no longer good for themselves. ~ John Muir