Clapper Pros and Cons

We've been in our house now for 11 years, and I absolutely love it, but... for some reason, the person who built it had an absolute terror of overhead lighting.  They built an entire house with precisely two overhead light fixtures, one in the kitchen, one in the hall.  If they could have figured out a way to put a lamp in the hall, I think they would have left that out as well. 

At any rate... no overheads.  So we have lamps - lots of lamps.  For the bedroom, one of our first purchases was a clapper - one of those hi-tech ones that can run two different devices, so there's a separate lamp for each side of the bed.  Normally, it works great, except...

There are two natural enemies of the clapper.  Small, excitable, German dogs (Hi, Moose) and women with the plague.  As it happens, my coughing happens to be at the precise rate necessary to set off (and on and off and on) the clapper.  And so is Moose's barking - which is brought on by my coughing.  At one point this morning, I swear the lights were cycling like a disco.