While on her trip down the Rhine (or maybe it was up the Rhine), my wife ordered a cuckoo clock. It arrived a few days ago. Alas, it is not some work of Old World Craftsmanship; for all I know, it was made in China. Gaudy. Big – 47 cm wide, nearly 60 tall. It cuckoos and plays music every hour. There are three weights, 2.7 pounds each, one for the cuckoo mechanism, one for the clock and one to run the music box part of the show.
When I unpacked it, “Home Shopping Network” came to mind.
It depicts a bierhaus scene with old guys raising their steins on the hour while one of them is clunked on the head by a woman with a rolling pin. There are also an animated water wheel and dancers whirling and spinning when the music plays. Outside is a fellow driving a horse-drawn beer wagon and there’s a small church, not to scale, and a pine tree. And a steeple bell on the bierhaus. Kitschy. Doesn’t seem to blend well with the adjacent shelf of Kachinas.
At first, it lost 35 seconds per hour. I’ve been tweaking it and overnight it gained 1.65 seconds in 9 hours. I’m curious how close I can get it and how consistent it will be. And how long it will last.