...except after "C"

So I was in the video store last night picking up the first season of Alias for my beloved wife, who recently discovered the show and wants to catch everything she's been missing for the last five years, and I ran into some friends that I hadn't seen in a while. They don't live in the area, so I did some quick deduction to figure out what might have brought them into town - probably visiting family. So I asked, "How is your mother?" In the very moment that the final syllable crossed the threshold of my mouth I had the sinking feeling that I had just done something worse than asking a fat person when the baby is due. Sure enough, back came the response, "My mother passed away a few weeks ago." How do you recover from that moment?
Links to this post