The Case of To Insure or Not to Insure

You would think that with a name like “Ace” I’d be a pro at tennis. You would be wrong. My inability to play the sport begins with my inability to establish my dominant hand, since I’m ambiguously ambidextrous. Thus, on the court, it’s mighty difficult to determine which shots should be forehands and which should be backhands, so I typically end up jostling my racket from hand to hand in hopes that one would make up its mind.

There is one good thing about being a poor tennis player: it’s the only time I hear women call out my name with any sense of enthusiasm. Like my opponent today at the indoor tennis center, Stephanie, who was particularly fond of scorching her serves in my direction with such vigor, I would rarely place a racket on them. After which, Stephanie would yell, “Ace!” with a joyous fist-pump, and although I know it’s the term for making your opponent whiff at your serve, I would answer each shout with a “Yes?”

I foolishly made a wager with Stephanie on the outcome of today’s match. If I won, she would set me up on a date with one of her friends. Any of them; I wasn’t picky. Even her pal Maureen who shaved her head just to expose more skin to tattoo. Any of her friends…except Vidalia, a woman with an obscure medical condition that made her smell as sweet as her onion-ly name suggested. And if Stephanie won, Vidalia it is.

Even though I was playing some of the best tennis of my life, Stephanie had a 5-0 lead in the last set, up 45-love and serving for the win. I had to either miraculously return her serve or else, and luckily the “or else” wondered onto our court and took the full brunt of Stephanie’s serve right on his noggin.

“Are you okay?” I asked the wandering man who barely noticed the collision.

“I’m looking,” he said, scanning the tennis center, “for someone who knows more about insurance than tennis.”

“I’m your man. Ace Insura here. What’s the problem?”

“My name is Chris, and I have an insured who just installed a $100,000 clay tennis court on their personal property. What are their coverage options for physical damage? Is there a coverage for clay tennis courts similar to a ‘greens’ coverage for golf courses? I just can’t figure it out.”

“Chris,” I said. “I think Shakespeare said it best when he wrote, ‘to insure or not to insure, that is the question.’”

Why was Ace misquoting the bard?

Click here to check your solution against Ace’s.

Jonathan Hermann (hermannism@gmail.com) is an IA contributing editor.