Tony Deyal | Wild Bill Hiccup writes again

A man runs into a bar and asks for a glass of water. Instead of pouring the water, the bartender pulls out a shotgun and yells at him. The man thanks the bartender, then walks out of the bar happily. Why did the bartender behave as 'dread' as he did, and why, despite the evidence, did the man thank the bartender?

This is a lateral-thinking puzzle designed for people who can walk and chew gum at the same time. The best answer is that the man had a hiccup, and knowing that hastily drinking a glass of water, especially from what is known as 'the far side of the glass', might cure it, requested the water.

The bartender, realising that a good scare or fright was known to be more effective, pulled out the gun and yelled. The man, happy that his hiccups had been cured, thanked the bartender and walked out in high spirits without even touching a drop of the stuff.

At the time of writing, October 24, 2018, I have so far suffered 18 days of almost continuous hiccupping. For someone like me, so old that I distinctly remember when a hiccup was a 'hiccough' (said to be the incorrect assumption that it originates from the word cough), it is tough on me and my family.

The only thing my wife Indranie has not yet tried is pulling a gun on me and, given that after six doctors, various blood tests, ECG and CT scans, the problem persists like flooding in Trinidad, she will need to reach for a howitzer. Fortunately for me, I seem to have respite this morning and so, having missed providing a column last week for the first time in 25 years, there is a patch of blue in the sky both over flooded Trinidad and my life.

The worst few days came last weekend when we were in Barbados for the graduation of my son Zubin. I had made it clear that so long as there was even a vestige of life in these limbs, I would find my way there despite the rain and floods in Trinidad and even if I had to row to Barbados, I would do it. Fortunately, it did not come to that 'oarsome' feat, but I got there in bad shape. The hiccups had got worse.

 

Nicest and brightest

 

I went on the web-messaging service of Professor Henry Fraser, GCM, BSc (Physiology), MBBS, PhD (Pharmacology), FACP, FRCP, former senator and one of the nicest and brightest people you would ever meet in several lifetimes. I was surprised that he did not respond immediately, so I then tried Dr Wayne Welsh, who had successfully managed the birth of my two Bajan children. I knew that even though the best gynaecologist in Barbados could not deliver me from the hiccups, he would have at least one colleague who could.

It did not work out given that it was weekend. We returned Sunday night and decided not to tempt fate by trying to drive home through the flooded highway, so we stayed in Port-of-Spain where, early on Monday morning, I got a call from Professor Fraser, who observed, simply, that his phone number is listed in the Barbados telephone directory and that given the circumstances, I should have called him. Of course, I blame the hiccups for my not thinking of the obvious.

He told me one other thing. A joke about hiccups. A man entered a drugstore and asked to see the pharmacist. When the pharmacist came out, the man asked if he could give him a cure for the hiccups. The pharmacist immediately reached out and slapped him across the face. "What'd you do that for?" the man asked. "Well, you don't have the hiccups anymore, do you?" "No," the man replied, "but I'd bet that my wife out in the car still does!"

There is another variation of this joke that is almost as funny. One day, a man walked into a doctor's office and this nun was running out crying. He asked the doctor, "Doc, what did you do to that poor nun that made her so upset that she ran out of your office in tears?" The doctor answered, "I told her that she's pregnant." The man replied in total astonishment, "The nun is pregnant? How? I mean, she looked like she's in her sixties, and besides ... ." The doctor shrugged, "Well, at least it cured her hiccups."

 

Sinister undertone

 

None of my doctors had the nerve to break that kind of news to me. It might work on Arnold after the film Junior, but not on me. Besides, I don't look like him or any other 'star-boy', and, to repeat what one of my friends said, jokingly I hope, except his cackling laughter had a sinister undertone, "One good thing about your looks, they're a good cure for hiccups. Have you tried looking into a mirror?"

Right ... . Is it better to die laughing or from hiccups? If I was a bartender, I would have pulled a gun on my friend and not as a hiccup remedy either. However, I can still laugh at my own predicament. So what's the answer to this riddle, "What's grey and wrinkly and jumps every 20 seconds?" Not me. The real answer is an elephant with hiccups.

Perhaps I will try it on the doctor I am due to see tomorrow with the results of a scan I did yesterday. My experience with the scan reminded me of the joke about the man who took his very ill duck to the vet. First, the doctor brought in a dog and it gravely licked the duck. Then he brought in a cat, which sniffed the duck and then the duck died. The heartless doctor told the man that the cost of the visit was $3,000.

When the outraged man demanded an explanation from the doctor for the extremely high cost, especially since the doctor had done nothing at all, the response was, "It's $1,500 for the lab test, and $1,500 for the CAT scan."

- Tony Deyal was last seen asking Professor Fraser, "What is green and can jump a mile in a minute?" A grasshopper with hiccups!