Vicky Ewan: Teasmade troubles and ticking clocks

Just lately, it has felt like I have been at odds with Time itself - rather an unsettling experience, but a multi-faceted one. To wit: I predominantly engage our smart speaker as a radio, enjoying the cheery tones of the chipper weekday morning presenter as I bustle about the kitchen, preparing breakfast, packing lunch for my younger son, and cajoling him downstairs at a reasonable hour. Lulled into a false sense of security by the regular time checks from the radio DJ, I consistently forget that the smart speaker is subject to a slight delay - its 8am news that might be broadcast at 8.03 or so. Those extra three minutes, though otherwise insignificant, are a crucial factor in whether my son and I leave the house on time.

In addition, the large clock affixed to the wall at the bottom of the stairs that I pass every time I enter or leave the kitchen is suffering from a gradually declining battery. Despite one part of my brain registering this fact, the earlier time on display - plausibly similar to the real-time - erroneously reassures me that I have a little more time at my disposal than I thought - only to induce panicked scampering once the synapses in other parts of my brain are firing. Change the batteries! I hear you cry - and I know I should; I just never seem to observe the discrepancy at a convenient moment.

Popping over to my dad’s house before school will often exacerbate matters, as the two analogue clocks I encounter therein stopped working long ago, and, as the saying goes, are only right twice a day; unfortunately, neither of those times generally coordinates with my visits. (Change the batteries! I hear you cry; see previous excuse for details). Habitually, I catch sight of the sole visible digital clock as I am making my way to the door, its brightly hued numbers a shiny accusation of my tardiness; cue hasty perambulation up multiple hills and a breathless arrival at the school gates. At home, I have no bedside clock, relying on either my husband's alarm clock display or my phone screen. I was thrilled, therefore, to receive a Christmas gift from my elder daughter that would inform me of the time and simultaneously furnish me with a fresh brew - she had bought me a Teasmade! I remember my parents owning an example of this iconic apparatus when I was a child; its ability to provide them with a piping hot cuppa alongside their morning alarm, and thereby remove the sting from the first moment of wakefulness, fascinated me. I’m not sure to what fate it sadly succumbed, but I don’t recall seeing their Teasmade past my pre-teen years. 

Unwrapping my own was like taking a trip into a satisfying past; I was excited to plug it in and get it bubbling and made sure to read the pamphlet first, anxious that nothing should go wrong with this new treasure. The instructions informed me that I should carry out an initial trial, sans tea bag, to ready the machine for use. I carefully filled the reservoir via the ceramic jug provided, set the jug in place, turned the switch on, and sat back to await the ‘whoosh’ of the heated water filling the jug, as the booklet promised. Sure enough, I soon heard the liquid reach boiling point and flood the jug; extracting this receptacle, I was pleased to note the process was complete. I consulted the text once again, adhering to its guidelines for setting the time and alarm on the device.

Heeding the manual ticking of the analogue clock, I hoped my husband would have no objection to this new (but rather soothing) sound. I refilled the reservoir, placed a teabag in the empty jug, positioned my mug on the handy flat surface on top of the Teasmade, and anticipated my morning wake-up with pleasure - even setting my usual phone alarm to go off just beforehand so that I could witness the machine’s inaugural action. Awakening at the appointed hour, I glanced eagerly at the Teasmade. My sleep-addled brain was struggling to compute what I was seeing, but I eventually realised that the clock face was showing the wrong time. Assuming I had set it incorrectly, and regretfully resigned to my tea-free rising, I activated a new phone alarm and drifted back to sleep. Examining the device with more cognitive aptitude later that morning, I began to suspect that it wasn’t me at fault, but the machine.

To test this theory, I reset the time and left it to run. When I returned some hours later, my suspicions were confirmed: despite the merry ticking of the second hand, and its obedient clockwise rotation, the time hadn’t shifted so much as a minute; clearly, I had an impaired device. Undaunted, I spirited the Teasmade away to exchange it for a working model, only to be informed that every store nationwide AND the website were out of stock - a fitting development in my ongoing skirmish with Time, perhaps, but a wholly unwelcome one. And so, we battle on, though I am determined to be the victor (after all, it’s in my name). Let’s just hope it’s a case of cometh the hour, cometh the (wo)man.