It doesn't pay to have a smart clock!

We have a smart clock. It is too smart for its own good--or maybe that should be too smart for our good. Today, once again, our smart clock outsmarted us.

We don't often sleep in on Sundays, but today was our day to do so as we had been to Mass last night. The clock radio comes on at 7 a.m., but dozing off and on through an hour of music, news, and radio features is easy enough when we don't have to get up. It was especially easy today.

At the end of that hour the announcer said it is almost 7 o'clock. It is the local announcer--a consummate professional but they do sometimes err. "He's got the time wrong, hmm." I thought as I took a quick look at the smart clock. My clock is smart. It says it is almost 8 o'clock. Close eyes again and wonder why they didn't do the regularly featured puzzle at twenty to eight.

You see, my clock is so smart that it changes automatically for daylight savings time--kind of like the computer does. Only problem is that the computer has downloaded an update telling it that the powers that be have changed the date when daylight savings time goes into effect. The smart clock, smart as it is, is uninformed. It still thinks the time changes at the first weekend of April, so it changes.

It thought that also back when I had changed the battery that keeps this wondrous system in effect when the power goes out but did not get the date set correctly. So sometime in February we were waken an hour early and had to reset the smart clock. Then once again we had to set it manually when daylight savings did come into effect. And now again will do so because it thinks that this weekend is daily savings time.

It repeats in the fall, but backwards.

What a dumb smart clock!