Morning Pleasures
19 August 2008
The high-pitched sound of a mobile phone alarm, with rapidly increasing noise levels, is not under any circumstances a pleasure.
I doubt there are many people who really enjoy the moment they wake up but there are ways to make it a more enjoyable experience.
In what has been rather like a damage limitation exercise I have, over the last year, tried and tested various ‘pleasures’ in the morning to make the wailing of my Samsung phone slightly more bearable. For a while I would put my underwear and socks on the boiler so when I put them on they were hot. The problem was they became cold again, very quickly and when they did, the soft cotton they were made from became crispy and uncomfortable. I once tried running a ridiculously hot bath just before I went to bed in the hope, that by the morning, it might be a refreshing temperature to jump in to. This did not work. It was during the winter and I had left a bathroom window open. It was unbearably cold and left me shivering for most of the morning.
After six months of trial and error, and a few small investments, I have now found a winning combination that allows me to enjoy the mornings. There will never be any pleasure gained from waking up to the exasperating electronic melody of a mobile phone alarm. It must be murdered and replaced with a daylight simulator alarm clock from True-sun. Waking up (almost) naturally and gently is unparalleled to being woken by a phone.
Now awake, the next thing I look forward to is slipping into my Turnbull and Asser dressing gown and making my way to the kitchen to play with my new coffee machine. I have never enjoyed the process of making coffee, especially in the mornings, but I derive a concerning amount of pleasure from placing an Arpeggio flavoured capsule in my ‘Le Cube’ style Nespresso machine. I then pull down the chrome handle puncturing the metallic roof of the capsule. As a child I found popping the bubbles on bubble wrap one of my greatest enjoyments. The moment the, now savaged, capsule falls into place is ten times as satisfying as bubble popping ever was. Once in place the coffee starts dripping out slowly into my awaiting cup. By this stage I have normally forgotten about the time already.
My final morning excitement, which regularly has me rushing out of the house, is my new Piaggio Vespa Scooter. It is the only vaguely civilised way to travel in London. The traffic in the city means driving a car or sitting in a taxi is unequivocally infuriating. Riding a bicycle, however gracefully, leaves you arriving at your destination sweating profusely and the underground has got far worse since William Morris described it almost 120 years ago as “a vapour-bath of hurried and discontented humanity”. A scooter epitomises liberation. It allows you to dictate your own journey time, travel from door to door, and park almost anywhere you like. It is unquestionable the greatest investment I have ever made.
-Henry Sands
Can you recommend any ‘morning pleasures’? If so, we would like to hear from you.
Truesun Alram clocks: www.truesun.com
Turnbull and Asser: 71&72 Jermyn Street, London, SW1Y 6PF. 0207-808-3000
BMG Scooters: 280 Fulham Road, London, SW10 9EW. 0207-351-0110
Nespresso: Nespresso CLub, 1 Butterwick, London, W6 8DL. 0800 442 442
August 19th, 2008 at 2:38 pm
The sound of the waves from the Pacific Ocean are my alarm clock, sadly they don’t have a snooze button though.
August 19th, 2008 at 2:44 pm
I would say my partner provides a pretty good ‘morning pleasure’…