Shear Terror

There are some days that you get out of bed and know it is going to be a great day. You’re fully confident that things are going to get done, fun is going to be had, and hell, even traffic is going to be on your side. And for most of the morning, your prophecy even holds form. But then one thing can send it in the wrong direction. And as you guessed, my yesterday is a prime example.

It wasn’t drowsiness: I got 8 and a half hours of sleep.
It wasn’t lack of fun: I snuck in a game of garbage can basketball.
It wasn’t traffic lights: I saw so much green I could’ve been in Ireland.

No, it was something else that I had no control over, and it threatened to ruin my Wednesday. And it wasn’t something external that I could run away from, either. This was internal. This was detrimental. And this was personal.

I had the hiccups.

There are WAY worse maladies that the hiccups from an outside perspective. Smoking will take years off one’s life. The chicken pox will get you quarantined in your bedroom for a week. Mad cow disease will, um, force you to uncontrollably hold out the vowels sounds in words like “moon,” “maroon,” and “baboon.” But hiccups? Far more annoying.

Over the course of the day, I had two major title bouts with Sugar Ray Hiccup and several smaller scrums. The smaller battles would last 15-25 minutes and would only set me back once a minute or so. I could control these. When I had to have conversations with my co-workers, I could sense when the next one would hit. I knew the window of opportunity I had before the next diaphragm spasm would hit. In that time, I could fully function – get printouts from the departmental printer, make it to the mail center and back, or even ask questions and get answers and make it back to my desk before my neck recoiled in a violent thrust again. Like I said, these were the minor scrums.

But twice, I found myself completely outmatched and overwhelmed. The first was around 2pm, about an hour after my Caesar salad for lunch. I couldn’t make it 30 seconds between hiccups. This would be okay, if I worked at home, didn’t have to talk to anybody, and played video games for a living. But sadly, I work with people, I use the phone, and Madden 06 isn’t exactly on my laptop.

You know how hard it is to talk on a phone with the hiccups? Every seventh word sounds like you’re trying to inhale the receiver, you repeatedly bang your ear against the top part of the handset, and the person on the other end of the line has to figure out just what you meant by “I thiccupnk thiccupat our best option is to hiccupold our current strategies in Hiccupoustion and Chiccupago. *Sneeze.*”

But like I said, I had two major fits yesterday, of which I could do nothing but wait them out. The other happened when I was packing up to head home for the day. On most days, this would be a perfect time to do battle with hiccups. I drive home for 40 minutes, never break the speed plateau of 35 mph thanks to traffic, and by the time I get home, they should be hiccup history. And yet yesterday, I feared for my very life? Why, might you ask?

I was leaving work to go get a haircut.