On my way to work, down the Busy Road, I pass a very large clock with big red LED numbers on it. It shows the time, for the sole reason of showing me how late I am running. It also shows the temperature so I know just how stupid I was coming out in just a t-shirt.

The clock and I have been having a running battle. When the clocks were changed last October, no one bothered to change it. That was easy. All you had to do was remember to knock an hour off. Or add one on. I can never remember. I just did whichever made sense at the time.

And then someone tried to reset it. But it didn't work. They managed to make a bigger mess of it than George Lucas did of Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace. They reset it 5 hours and 19 minutes fast.

It was quite a shock the first day when I came home from work and the clock was showing 23:26. And so for the next 6 months I would be coming home at various times between eleven o'clock and midnight. It really is dispiriting when you come home and think you've got to straight to bed.

Anyway, all this came to head in March when the clocks went forward or backward. After three weeks someone else tried to reset the clock and did so almost perfectly. They got the hour right but were just 14 minutes fast. And so, since March, I have adjusted to knocking 14 minutes off the time.

Today I got up late. I looked up at the clock and thought, "Well at least I have 14 minutes..." You can see where this is going can't you?

I suppose I could always wear a watch.