I have one of their Time and Tide clocks that takes a single AA battery. In recent weeks it works for awhile, then stops. I've cleaned the battery contacts and changed batteries a few times, which helps for awhile, but then the clock stops again. I was going to toss it and get a new one, but here in the UK they want about $150 at the local chandler. Yikes, I don't need a clock that badly, especially when the motor looks like a cheap $2 component and makes this entire clock look like a pretty but way-overpriced POS. The clock isn't that old, maybe 6 years. Pretty disappointing.

My slight rant above and others we've shared on this board remind me of a great expression I learned recently from a 20-something American female who made her first offshore voyage by helping an older British fellow sail his Contessa 32 from the UK to the Azores. The two of them encountered a fair bit of rough weather and by his account, she was an excellent crew member and handled the very trying conditions with aplomb. We met them in the Azores, and over drinks someone would be complaining about the the marina's laundry dryers not being up to snuff and other observations in that vein.

Sally would say, simply, 'that's a first-world complaint.'

Great expression. May all our complaints be first world.