BURGER SCOOT

It was an elementary schoolmate, Stephan, responding to my cries of “I hate the hiccups,” who told me the sure way to cure the hiccups: swallow three full mouths of water upside down. It sounded like a cruel joke: have someone gulp a mouthful of water, bend down as if the fellate themself (though I was a few years away to knowing the word fellatio mean), straighten up to take in another gulp of water only to see Stephan and his buddies gathered around trying to suppress horse laughs, but it worked and Stephan was nowhere to be found.

Nearly half a century later, the trick still works, regardless of how stupid an old geezer performing Stephan’s Rx looks.

It is not foolproof: The cure only works if you can get to water fast enough. If I wake up with the hiccups I’m usually screwed unless the first hiccup wakes me up then I can spring out of my BED, scaring the shit out of my wife and our three cats in the process and get to the bathroom sink and start this process. I am out of luck if traveling by plane, car, or elevator, and it is as if the hiccups know it, too!