How to use the online alarm clock
Eight in the morning is the private sector's turn. A large share of companies here start at eight and another large share at nine, which is why the morning peak lasts as long as it does rather than concentrating into a single half hour. Clinics open their appointment lines, banks unlock their branches, and the free zone business parks fill within twenty minutes.
It is also the hour when the roads punish imprecision most heavily. The approaches to the main interchanges, the tunnel crossings and the bridges over the Creek all reach their worst around now, and an alarm at ten past eight rather than eight is not a lie-in — it is a different arrival time altogether.
For anyone working with Europe there is an opposite use for this hour: eight in the morning here is very early in London and Frankfurt, so an alarm at this time is often about getting the quiet stretch of work done before anyone at the other end is awake to interrupt it. Every minute in this hour has a page of its own.
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