The guaranteed cure for hiccups

When I was 11 or so some friends of someone I guess I was related to showed up with Aunt so & so and camped out with us. [this is when we were part of Fiji’s international airport staff community]

Sweet deal for them, [I’d take it]; front up with assured accommodation scenario – and, worst case; sing for your supper.

So, while I didn’t totally get the connection with these strangers in our house – my parents seemed to dig them and that made them… approachable.

One of ‘them’ was a joker – and maybe not a very good one. “Why is it a good idea to sprinkle peas around a rabbit burrow? So when they come up for a pea [pee] you can whack them on the head!”

His repertoire also included numerous really rather racist jokes that I have [almost] never repeated.

Memorably, he did some other curious things against advice – eg; he was definitely told, in advance, ‘don’t eat pawpaw seeds’ – we all knew that, and yet he went ahead & did it anyway.

Well, as was observed by all around with just about every sense, his sudden increase in bathroom requirements did make him cognisant of local wisdom.

But then, something happened with this guy that has changed my life forever.

I got the hiccups. And he noticed.

The advice he then gave me seemed worth a go, so I followed it. And… it worked.

Then some time later, with another bout of hiccups, it worked again.

In fact, in the 48 years since, this technique has NEVER ONCE failed me – NOR anyone to whom I have described the technique.

Was it the commanding power of the worldly, comic guy from ‘somewhere else’ whose word was definite?

Or was it an actual, quantifiable technique that has eluded generations of world citizens?

Heck, I dunno.

Obviously, I’ve wondered this – & the most relevant part is what a big old skeptic of pretty much all alternative mumbo-jumbo I am.

So why does this work?

I DON’T KNOW!

But it does – & I don’t know where Mr Mystery got it from.

What can I say? If you ever have the hiccups, try it. You have literally nothing to lose. (Except the hiccups)

All I can say is; you MUST follow the instructions TO THE LETTER.

Any deviation cannot expect results.

The guaranteed, never-fail cure for hiccups

On the face of it this technique will resemble a few others from old folk wisdom. But the devil is in the details. Here we go…

• STEP 1: Roughly half fill a glass with water. (Or gently, that’s fine too)
• STEP 2: Place a knife, blade first, into the glass.
• STEP 3: Raise the glass to your mouth and press the handle of the knife to your forehead.
• STEP 4: Look down into the glass at the very tip of the knife blade.
• STEP 5: Tilt the glass back and start to drink – still looking at the tip of the knife.
• STEP 6: Keep drinking until the water is gone, NEVER ONCE TAKING YOUR EYES OFF THE TIP OF THE KNIFE…

That’s it. If you follow those instructions exactly, your hiccups will be gone.