CALL ME SNAKE

I just withdrew some money from the ATM and wrote it down in the “ledger” when I got home. To my surprise, my balance was off by $500 and the discrepancy (not surprisingly) was in the bank’s favor, meaning I had $500 less in the account than I thought. How could that be? I called the bank and after many frustrating dead ends on the convenient, easy-to-use telephone phone banking line, I finally managed to learn about recent activity on the account, which suggested I had failed to write down withdrawals three or four times in the last month. I’m usually scrupulous about that sort of thing (to the point of being called “anal,” though I personally despise the term), and I couldn’t understand how I’d made so many errors in a single month.

Then it dawned on me: Maybe it’s the Red Sox. They’re stumbling of late (still hanging onto 1st place, but just barely) and making tons of errors in the process. Last night Damon dropped one he should have had, Wells failed to cover first, and the shortstop Renteria (known as “Rent-an-Error” on local sports radio with his major-league-leading 29 errors) booted another–all of which contributed to an 8-7 loss to the Devil Rays on a night when the Yankees won with a “walkoff” (a first by rarely-used reserve Bubba Crosby), pulling to within a half game of the Sox. There’s no doubt about it: The errors are going around these days, and it’s even affected my bookkeeping. I need to talk to Terry Francona soon about shoring up that sagging defense, before I lose the home and end up on the streets–maybe in front of the 7-11 I keep talking about–with a tattered Red Sox hat providing my only shelter.