I can't sleep without a ticking clock somewhere in the house. The chimes never bother me either ~ unless they go beyond 13. We have an old clock in the room beneath our bedroom. It was my Grandfather's and when he moved into a home for retired soldiers he gve it to my mother. The day he died it struck 27 times at about the time of death ~ frit mother halfway to death herself when an hour later she received a telegram telling her that her father had passed away. Anywhooo she stopped the chimes and until she died it never chimed again although it ticked merrily on for another 40 odd years. Come her death the clock passed into my hands and I wound up the chimes and set it ticking. As it reached the first hour it chimed 27 times 
Then it settled into a normal chime on the half hour and the appropriate number of chimes to mark each hour.
When I had my bypass operation (at about 7 in the evening) and they stopped my heart and allowed the heart/lung machine to take over the task Mrs S#2 tells me the clock struck 13 times. It has on several occasions since struck 27 times and on each occasion we have subsequently heard of a death in the family. Mrs S#2 will not now permit me to wind up the chimes.
Spooky - isn't there a song about that...? 
You are perhaps thinking of "My Grandfather's Clock"
Which starts with the lines
"My Grandfathers clock was too big for the shelf
So it spent all it's life on the floor"
Hang on and I'll Google the rest of the lyric if you really want.
My particular Grandfather's clock is not a "Grandfather Clock" but a mantle clock that chimes ~ OK?
It is, in fact, of American manufacture and he bought it when at sea in his younger days before WWI so it isn''t even an heirloom as such. Just an old clock.
