Digital Pocket Watch

To be honest, the idea of a digital pocket watch isn't real appealing because television history has only recorded train conductors and cowboys pulling out their pocket watches and looking at an analog face with Roman numerals and two hands. The camera would swoop in on the dial face, and the viewer knew it was almost high noon and something bad awful was about to happen. If a person is going to buy a beautiful pocket timepiece that is gold plated or even 14K, and have a matching chain coming out of one vest pocket and into another pocket, why would anyone want to open that engraved cover and stare at digital numbers blinking back at him? Frankly, it's just a little bit of a convoluted idea to this writer. But thank goodness, there are many digital pocket watches that can be purchased out there with a dial face if someone has a mind to do so.

On the other hand, how hip can a person be to own an atomic digital watch which has one very nice feature. Atomic clocks and timepieces are reset daily via radio signal from the National Institute of Standards and Technology transmitter in Fort Collins, Colorado. The atomic (or radio-controlled) digital clocks and timepieces maintain time accuracy to within a single second of official United States government time. The radio signal has an effective range of approximately 2,000 miles (covering the continental United States) and even automatically updates the atomic digital watches for Daylight Savings Time! A person can often see the hands on radio controlled wall clocks with a dial face racing around at breakneck speed to display the proper time, and radio controlled watches that feature dial faces are the same.

Electronic time pieces such as a digital pocket watch have been around since 1970 and were created after an inspiration came to the inventor upon seeing a 1968 science fiction movie that featured the prop of an electronic clock. The first electronic timepieces had a red light-emitting diode and had to be pushed on to see the time, and only then for just a few seconds because LEDs took so much battery power. Later liquid crystal displays or LCDs came into vogue and needed much less battery power, so the display remained on perpetually. Thus, the digital pocket watch and wrist timepiece were on the consumer scene indefinitely. These timepieces have always been very accurate, but step aside for the atomic standard of accuracy.

Scientists have just presented a new type of atomic clock that is accurate to within one second every two hundred million years. They were unhappy with its predecessor, which was only accurate to one second every eighty million years! Go figure. But atomic digital watches receive a daily radio wave correction from the NIST and maintain accuracy within a second a day. The little secret is that wall clocks and timepieces that are marketed as atomic are really just electronic timepieces that receive daily radio wave updates to keep them accurate. So no, there is no truth to the rumor that a person can get radiation burn from an atomic clock because there is nothing radioactive about them!

A digital pocket watch can come in many styles and most are not real expensive. In fact, many of this kind of timepiece is really designed for the sporting person who would rather have a timepiece in the pocket of some cargo shorts or on a belt buckle, rather than on the wrist, perhaps impeding some range of motion. An electronic pocket timepiece can have a number of optional features, depending on the wearer's needs. These options can include water resistance, a chronograph, thermometer, compass, bottle opener, a magnifying glass and a partridge in a pear tree. Not really. But the cost of buying one of these timepieces can be very reasonable running from forty to one hundred and fifty dollars. Not only is a person getting the convenience of a pocket timepiece design, but also the accuracy and toughness of an electronic timepiece.

The possibility styles for atomic digital watches are quite remarkable. Of course these timepieces really should be called radio controlled digital watches, because as stated earlier, there is nothing atomic about them. Let's begin with a mouthful. Solar atomic digital watch or better yet, solar radio controlled digital timepiece. About two hundred dollars is all it will cost to have a timepiece that never ever has to be messed with because it can do it all alone. The wearer will just be going along for the ride. "Call unto me, and I will show thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not." (Jeremiah 33:3)

In actuality, battery powered atomic digital watches are quite inexpensive. These timepieces can run from thirty dollars to five hundred dollars, depending on the type of casing or housing and the options each watch has. Most have analog type faces and a few possess the actual electronic readouts. So if a consumer is buying for accuracy an electronic timepiece is a good choice, and if the consumer is buying for the person who needs accuracy within, say, one second every million years or so, then definitely the "atomic" moniker in front of the timepiece is a desirable option. This writer has it on good authority that a million years from now, those basking in the pleasures of God's eternity won't exactly need any timepiece. Hmm, a place where a person can never be late for anything. Tasty.

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