IT STARTED innocently enough. While I was braving the cold to retrieve a Christmas package delivered to the front stoop, our next-door neighbor pulled into her driveway. "Hey, neighbor!" she called. "If you and your lovely wife don't have any plans for later, why not drop by our place sometime between six and nine? We're having some friends over for snacks and holiday cheer!" Of course, I said we'd be there. Little did I know (although I should have suspected) the turn this tale would soon take. No, not into the Twilight Zone but someplace far more sinister: the dark, nether regions of insurance underwriting. We were entering The Insurance Zone!

So early that evening, as I was warmly ensconced in our neighbors' kitchen, sipping a Diet Coke and munching a few of those ubiquitous meatballs found at all such gatherings, the husband leaned against the counter and innocently asked the question that would change everything: "Hey, you work with insurance stuff, right?"

Oh, sweet muse. If only I had taken the biblical Peter's route and, seeing there were no cocks about to crow and reveal my duplicity, denied all. Or if only I had pleaded the gaiety of the holiday season as an excuse to refrain from talking about business, or succumbed to a fit of intentional coughing and begged my leave. But alas, all too easily I succumbed. "Sure," I simply responded, "Got something I can help you with?"