I think I have too many beepy things.

 

A lot of the gadgets that beep at me do so at my request. The timer on my stove, for example, will beep when the specified time has elapsed.

 

My clock radio will beep or buzz or turn on the radio at a time of my choosing. A time of my choosing, that is, assuming I can remember that “AM” is an abbreviation for both “ante meridiem” and “amplitude modulation,” and that those two AMs should not be confused when choosing a time to get up and a radio station to listen to when getting up. I have to confess, also, that I have never asked it to do anything but turn on the radio. But it says right there on the front that it will also beep or buzz, so I count it among my beepy things.

 

There’s an alarm function on the calendar part of my PDA. When I set it, it beeps insistently every three minutes until I poke it in the face.

 

My security system is the all-time champion beepy thing. It beeps when I come home to remind me I have 30 seconds to punch in my code (more beeps) before it assumes I’m one of the bad guys and calls the authorities. It beeps when I leave to remind me I have 30 seconds to get out the door before it makes that same assumption.

 

But many of my gadgets beep at me, not because I have asked them to, but because their designers and manufacturers decided, once the device was in my possession, I would need specific pieces of information. For example, my cell phone beeps mournfully if it needs recharging. My oven beeps when it has reached the set temperature, and is switching from “preheat” to “bake.”

 

The smoke detector where I used to live would beep when the battery was low; that was, indeed, good information to have. The one I have now was installed when the house was built, and is wired into the electrical system. I used to wonder sometimes, on the rare occasion I thought about it at all, if the builder was ever tempted to put some dummy cardboard thing up there instead of the real thing. After all, it doesn’t have to beep, and the chances of its ever being needed are pretty small. That was before I set my oven to “self clean” with a small puddle of spilled grease in the bottom.

 

I no longer wonder if my smoke detector is fake. I did learn, however, that I don’t know how to turn off a smoke detector, and I don’t remember where I put the instructions.

 

About a month ago, walking across my bedroom, I heard a beep from the living room. It was a different pitch and a different beep pattern from any of the beepy things I’m familiar with. I stopped and listened, and the beeping wasn’t repeated. Unless it happens when I’m out of the house, it has never been repeated since.

 

I have no idea what it was.

 

Has something died from lack of recharging? If so, I don’t know what it is, since all my beepy things seem to be in working order. Is one of my beepy things programmed to sing a different song and in a key different from the usual when it has something extraordinary to tell me? If so, I don’t know about it. Is ignorance bliss in this case?

 

I guess I’ll find out.

 

TK Magazine, November 2007

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