{∅, {∅}, {∅, {∅}}} : Rage Against the Meat Grinder

So, my mom hands me the phone and it's one of my aunts.   She confides to me that a younger sister of theirs who died three years ago had started complaining about not being able to swallow any food without a gulp of water.


Uh-oh.   She did not tell this to my mom.  So, the one aunt has gotten through to me, and I suppose there may be reason for a little alarm.  We will go to the hospital first thing in the morning.  Tonight The Mother will have to just rest.   It's not the kind of emergency that you run to the hospital in the middle of the night for.   It's only the kind of thing one ought to be somewhat alarmed about.  A morning trip to the hospital to see if there isn't something threatening lurking about.


I'm not a monster.  Just a male.  My aunt said that men are less likely to be concerned about such things, whereas women, for some reason, tend to take such things as not being able to get down food without water as a sympton of the Grim Reaper being on the premises and circling around.