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Ye Ol' Timepieces to modern watches
Added: (Wed Aug 27 2008)
Watches have been with us in one form or another since the 1600's. At first there were only pocket watches attached to a fob chain and kept in the pocket. Then they progressed to the wrist. Nowadays there are many different kinds of watches from no-nonsense, serviceable types to elegant fashion accessories.
Once watches simply told us the time; nowadays they do a host of others tasks as well. We can find out the time in any part of the world; the date; what the weather is about to do and many other things. In fact, some watches are more like mini-computers. Many have an alarm to wake us up; others have reminder functions that we can set.
A special diving watch can tell the diver how deep he is and how slowly he should surface to avoid getting the bends. It can record the total dive time, the minimum temperature and many other things. The diver can set alarms to alert him to bottom time and maximum depth. And another alarm to warn if he is ascending too quickly. Better still, it automatically switches to dive mode at 4 metres. It has analogue hands as well as a digital display.
While a gucci watch might have more function than the clocks of yesteryear they can certainly have a price to match modern inflation.