Thanks to garyomaha and M., there's a clock in my kitchen which sets itself according to a radio signal from an atomic clock deep in a heavily guarded underground bunker somewhere. It also has an alarm which was defaulted to 6 am.
The good news is I was up.
The bad news is I had no idea what was beeping and why.
Ah, the joys of a new house.
Life is good but busy, I am off to the Bay Area tomorrow.