Alarm Clock: "Run away! Run away!"

I am not one who finds it hard to get up. An early bird, I tend to hear the alarm right away - groan - turn it off and get right up. I don't think I have ever used a snooze alarm in my life. But in college I had a roommate who hit the snooze bar so often that he wore out 3 alarm clocks in two years. And of course, this means he missed more than his share of early-morning classes. Well, MIT has the solution for him! They have designed an alarm clock which sounds the alarm and immediately runs away to one corner of the room. A random corner of the room. Which means after the first buzz, the hapless night owl must search his or her room to find the clock and turn it off. Presumably in the process they will come to full consciousness, and be ready to greet the day.

Of course, this also reminds me of the time in college when an inconsiderate night owl turned his alarm up to the maximum volume and then left for a weekend excursion. It was so loud it woke up the entire floor, and without him there to turn it off, we eventually had to climb in a window to silence the thing. If the device had also been capable of fleeing its irate attacker, we might never have gotten any sleep!