Jackpot In Time

Douglas Adams wrote in Hitchhiker's Guide that the answer was 42.

I've been playing a game with time lately.  When I look at the clock I celebrate when I receive a run or a straight.  Like at three thirty-three.  It's coming, in a few minutes, as I write this sentence.  But I don't know for sure if I'll catch it.  I'm doing other things, after all.

I celebrate when it comes to me, and I try not to seek it out or "camp" on the clock until I get a winning combination.  It's kind of like playing the slots without the cash involved.  The payout is emotional, not financial.

I did some calculating after I had been playing for a few days and realized that there were 21 combinations of numbers that qualified as a jackpot in this game.  And then, with the am/pm, that number was doubled.

42.

My calculations have since shown a different solution (I forgot to include ten o'clock's three zeros), but it's still a bit of a fun play with time.  This way, when you wake up at four forty-four in the morning, you get a smile on your face, because you've hit a fortuitous time signature.

There was a time where my friend and I tried to catch each occurrence of the 12:34 time on my digital watch.  I think we only got three in a row before we abandoned the experiment.  Still, there was some exhilaration in the anticipation of seeing it happen.  Like the odometer thing.

And by the way, this is my two-hundred twenty-second blog.  Yesterday was February 22nd.  And I missed 3:33am because I've been blogging and surfing and linking and such.  I even missed 3:45. 

Maybe I'll start wearing a watch again.  Digital, of course.  Game doesn't work as well with clock hands.  Will this become an obsession?  Has it already?

Time will tell.