The Case of the Beeping Seat Belt

Waking Up

In an ideal situation, we would all be waking up to the sounds of a peaceful morning, the sounds of silence interrupted by the occasional chirruping of birds like cheeping Sparrows , cawing Crows or Koels cooing in maddening arpeggios? But how many of us , I daresay in Bombay at least, have this luxury? Many of us are woken up to sounds of temple bells, beating drums, wedding bands or honking cars, whizzing bikes or horror of horrors – the shrill alarm bell of your bedside clock.

Alarming Sounds

And these sounds continue throughout the rest of the day with doorbells that chime, telephones that ring in various tones, water filters that sing, pressure cookers that whistle and alarms that go off when something is not done properly as most modern gadgets these days are programmed to alert you to a situation that all is not entirely well. This is a safety device for which I’m eternally grateful because very often one gets so carried away in every day living that certain things tend to get forgotten along the way. Alerts on mobile phones for instance are a great help in reminding me of appointments, birthdays or chores that need to be done. Similarly, I can gauge the readiness of the meat cooking in the cooker by the number of whistles the pressure cooker has let off.

Eureka!

But while some sounds are welcome there are others that aren’t. Like those mobile phones that are singing all over the place for instance. The minute you hear this sound, you wonder where it’s coming from – your phone or another close by? Or the irritating car locks accidentally set off that continue screeching till someone turns it off.

That indeed is the most annoying and puzzle-some feature of all gadgets that sound alarms and alerts and one can literally spend a few worrying moments trying to locate the sound.

Yesterday I had finished my shopping trip and was all set to go home when the passenger seat belt alarm started bleeping and beeping. Now that was strange indeed because there was no one sitting in the chair. Looking under the dashboard I tried to see if some wire had accidentally touched anything but of course, in these modern cars where everything is streamlined and perfectly engineered, there aren’t any loose or hanging wires so it was quite a pointless exercise.

Then I looked at the back seat to see if anything over there could have triggered off the alarm. And there was nothing. So, I continued on my way and tried to ignore it when I accidentally cast my eye on the watermelon on the passenger seat.

Bingo! That was it – the 3 kg fat watermelon that sat smugly in the passenger seat.

Credit

This is my post for Write Tribe