Poster Power

In one of my regular restaurant dives in Times Square, they serve steak and as I was eating there recently, I noticed this HUGE poster titled “CHOKING.” And it had a person doing a serious Heimlich on the apparent choking person, and next to the chokee was a giant skeleton of a (dead) fish (they don’t even serve fish).

And this was hung so all the customers could see it, which really added to the ambiance. It was even framed. (Shouldn’t this be in the back room somewhere?) Is choking THAT big of a problem in this restaurant?

As I kept eating, I was drawn to the poster and started feeling strange things in my throat (no joke), and then I started coughing. But I kept breathing, but THEN I started hiccuping (never really written that word before). Then I knew I was in trouble because hiccups don’t go away easily, but I kept breathing and chewing and working my way through the steak and potato and drink and then got myself out of there.

In a way, you could say I choked that night. Either way, that was a close one. You ever choked?