Everyone else in the house wakes to your alarm - why can't you?

The BBQ Pit
1

My roommate/tennant Basement Dan is employed again. This is very good because employment = rent money.

As far as I’m aware, his job starts at 8 AM. I’m pretty sure the deal is that everyone needs to be there at 8 so they can get the trucks loaded and be on the road for installations at 9.

So, being that he has to be in at 8, he sets his alarm for 6:30 AM. Even though he sleeps in his clothes and shaves his head bald, it still takes him an hour to get ready in the morning. I do not inquire as to what the holdup is.

Even though he has a nice plug-in alarm clock across the room that beeps until you shut it off, he doesn’t use this as his wake-up device. He prefers to rely on his cell phone which he swears wakes him up better because it’s in his pocket. Only it doesn’t.

It wakes my dog up, though, who in turn wakes me up to let me know that something in the basement is making a noise. And, since we’re up, can you feed me and let me out? She’s getting quite ornery as she gets older and I usually have no choice but to acquiesce to her demands if I don’t want to spend the next half hour listening to her growl passive-aggressively at the foot of my bed.

So I’m up, Dolly’s up. We’re walking across the squeaky floor boards, I’m using the bathroom and banging the 4 doors between the inside and the back yard.

Basement Dan remains in Slumberland, though.

Today he rolled out around 8:30, making him an hour late for work. I think he’s been consistently one to two hours late for work ever since he started working again. One time his boss called here looking for him at 8:30 AM, interrupting my “between Dan’s alarm and my alarm” nap.

I used to date this guy who had a roommate with similar problems. Only the roommate would put on this blasting beeping alarm, accompanied by very loud metal music, around 4:30 AM and ignore it for an hour. This was seriously not fun when I was sleeping over after closing down the bar.

I’d like to train my dog to pay no mind to his alarm, but I don’t want to de-sensitize her to noises in the house. I’d like to think that I feel better knowing she cares enough to alert me to a burglar or a smoke alarm.

But damn, dude. Get the fuck up or give up on the alarm already. I am pretty sure that the cell phone method does not work for you. If I wasn’t so tired, I’d get Dolly to come down and growl passive-aggressively at the foot of YOUR bed.

Surely this happens to other people, right?

2

I wouldn’t worry about it. He’ll probably be fired before the end of the week.

3

As a Basement Dan type, I apologize.

I need an alarm clock that makes about 837 different noises, because I learn to tune any given alarm noise out pretty quickly. I’m not *ignoring *it, I just don’t hear it. I’m a very heavy and committed sleeper.

So I’m guessing you’re not willing to buy Basement Dan a super-special 837 noise alarm clock. But I’ll bet Basement Dan’s phone comes with a whole bunch of ringtones. You might suggest to him that he change it up often. Couldn’t hurt, might help.

4

As the girlfriend of a similar committed sleeper (great phrase!), I sympathize. Have you thought about getting him one of the alarm clocks that comes with a bed-shaker (they make them for the deaf)? I’ve been tempted to do this for my boyfriend, but the fact that we sleep in the same bed makes it a bit of a problem.

5

So his alarm wakes the dog who wakes you at least 2 hours before your alarm goes off?

Each time his alarm goes off, walk down there with a glass/bowl/bucket of ice water and throw it on him.

Somewhere in that tiny peanut-head his brain will start to associate “Noise in the morning with horribly shocking wake-up” and hopefully he’ll start waking up on time.

6

Ah no, I am not tempted to spend one red cent on the bastard.

I used to have to drive him to work for a short bit, and I would stand at the top of the basement stairs and pound on the wall with my fist and flash the lights. This did not always work, either.

I should take our bags of aluminum cans for recycling and accidentally drop them down the stairs every morning. But then, he’d never bring the bag back up and I’d just get pissed.

7

Wow. Good luck!

8

I go for the radio clocks for just this reason. The varying noise always awakens me.

9

I had that problem with a roommate once. The guy started his day three hours before I got up. Several discussions and two weeks of second chances had no effect. The fact that I went out of my way to be quiet in the evenings when he had to hit the sack didn’t help me out either.

I tried ear plugs but the noise cut right through. Finally after listening to that blaring buzz for over 1/2 hour one fine pre-dawn morning, I waltzed in there and turned the damn thing off. Two hours later I woke to the sound of frantic cursing as he scrambled out the door. We had words after work that night but I wasn’t going to put up with that shit any more, period. I only had to do that once more.

10

Ah, the alarm clock blues. No one really mentions these when you get married (they’re too busy warning you about insignificant things like squeezing toothpaste tubes and hanging rolls of toilet paper the right way). I’m a light sleeper with an internal clock - once I’m used to waking up at a certain time, I wake up on my own two minutes before my alarm goes off, at which point I get out of bed. Jim, on the other hand, while also a light sleeper, is not a morning person*, and hits the snooze button on his alarm about 15 times every morning.

  • “Not a morning person” is such a mild, innocuous phrase for how Jim feels about mornings. I think he would take a gun and shoot them if mornings ever corporealized. :smiley:

Have you tried sneaking downstairs and turning his alarm clock on for him? Surely he doesn’t want to get fired!

11

It doesn’t bother me that the alarm is waking the dog up. That’s my & her problem, not his.

It just pisses me off that I’m awake (much earlier than I need to be) and he is not awake, because I need him to be on time for work so I can keep getting paid rent.

I’m planning on getting rid of him in April or May, BTW. Then I’ll perhaps start a Basement Dan thread similar to The Ron Thread. If I tell you guys all of the “wtf?” moments I’ve had with this guy before I kick him out, it’ll just turn in to a “why don’t you kick him out already?!” thread :slight_smile:

12

Jim’s too kind. Me, I’d wanna make mornings suffer.

13

It’s waking the dog up, so instead of training the dog to ignore the sound, can you train the dog to wake your roommate up instead of you?

I know next to nothing about dogs, but this seems like a plausible solution.

14

Go, down into his room when basement Dan is not there. Set this nice plug-in alarm clock to go off at 6:15 AM. Crank the volume way up, too.

You might have to repeat a few times for him to get with the program.

15

Sounds like your roommate is a loser.

16

As the SO of yet another committed sleeper, I sympathize as well. I’ve suggested to cwPartner that a bed-shaker might be a good idea, but the idea was rejected. Does anyone know if there’s an alarm clock out there with an “electrified anal probe” option?

17

Tell us some wtf stories!

18

As someone who took a long time to be able to use alarm clocks, (For years, I would wake up enough to turn them off, but not enough to be cognizant of the fact that it was get-up time.*) I find it strange that people are suggesting more alarms.

**Simply pour a glass of ice-water on his face.
**

*Sometimes there’s still a delay:
ring
get up
turn off
go back to bed
“why was there noise if I’m so tired?”
“hmmm”
“oh, it’s get-up time!”

19

I’m not really sure what pouring ice water in his face would accomplish. He’s not my son - why do I need to completely piss him off just so he can be on time for work? Pissing him off might make him move out, but so would telling him to move out. I let him stay because the extra income is nice.

Maybe I’ll just go back to pounding on the stairwell wall to wake him up, since I’m up.

I could also take that time in the morning to go to the gym before work instead of after work. But it’s been so cooooolllld lately. Brrr!

Good idea, but I don’t want her going down into the basement. She’s already stolen some of the food he’s left lying around. And some socks. I don’t want to deal with whatever else she might find down there.

Nah. I’m serious in that people will just flame me for being too nice by letting him stay here. I’ll tell ya when he’s gone :slight_smile:

20

How about a grenade?