My uncle has horribly high diabetes. Apart from not being able to enjoy the many, many sweet things provided and made for people to enjoy, he has to consume, on a daily basis, a whole arsenal of pills and tablets in an entertaining variety of shapes, sizes and colours (just pronouncing their names had earlier kept me occupied for a good half hour) which he keeps in one of those plastic containers, subdivided into seven boxes: S M T W T F S
Also, he recently arrived from the US (it is significant).
We were having an entertaining conversation (about probability in game shows; great stuff, I'll talk about it some time) post-lunch when he suddenly breaks off and takes out a mini-carnival of pills from the box marked F.
Me: Friday?
Uncle: Yeah..um wait. What day is it? (No, I can assure you that he wasn't stoned; alcohol isn't good for his level of diabetes)
Me: Saturday
Uncle: Then why is my Friday bunch [of pills] still here. This is very weird.
I had my medicines yesterday, so did I take the Thursday dose then?
(we sit pondering what all this could mean)
Uncle: Ah. I think I understand. You see, while flying here, I technically skipped a day.
That was a really freaky thought: even though he had his proper dosage according to the 24-hour prescription, he had skipped a day while coming to India, which could have completely screwed up his dose; any fluctuations in the insulin level and he could be on a hospital bed.
So he was just plain lucky. There was, however, just one more problem:
The Saturday box was empty.
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