Hiccup!

Posted on February 14, 2007 by Melissa Worden

This funny story has a serious twist: A 15-year-old St. Petersburg, Fla., girl can’t stop hiccuping:

“Something like 50 times a minute, she hiccups, a staccato sensation that resembles a smoke alarm with a dying battery. Her mother, Rachel Robidoux, thinks Jennifer sounds like a barking chihuahua.”

Take the “When is it worth it” quiz on this one, and you’ll find you’ve got the makings of a multimedia project.

Sptimes.com chose to do so with an audio slideshow.

Cute and entertaining; the producer had fun with the timing of the photo placement. Nice use of the photos that could seem way too repetitive, but they don’t here. And using this format illustrates how funny the hiccups are at first and how completely annoying they quickly become.

Honestly, this isn’t nearly the best audio slideshow I’ve seen, and I’m not so sure about the “special report” tag at the top of this piece, but the content certainly made me stop long enough to write about it. Mission accomplished, I’d say.

Have a tip for her to to get rid of her hiccups? Sptimes.com set up a message board so you can help.

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Update: Matt Waite, staff writer for the St. Petersburg Times, blogged about how he pitched in on this now national story by gathering, editing and producing an audio clip of reader tips and reactions to the story.

And Angela Grant brainstorms some ways they could turn this into a package. I like this idea of hers especially:

“I’d like to see an animated graphic of the physical reasons people hiccup–why the diaphram spasms.”

Comments

3 Responses to “Hiccup!”

angela on February 15th, 2007 12:27 pm

I agree! My comments started to get pretty long, so I just posted some thoughts on my blog instead.
charels K.Paterson on February 26th, 2007 9:22 am

For this to work Jennifer must not be aware of the technique. You place a one dollar bill between her thumb and forefinger which she holds firmly and then, and this is important, without her knowing what is happening you jerk the bill out of her grip. As a teacher I have found this works every time. It is magic!
susan vogel on February 26th, 2007 11:05 am

Try taking a wedge of a fresh piece of LIME…..and suck on it……It worked for me a few times.Don’t know exactally why But it did..so it’s worth the try…GOOD LUCK!

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