maybe i should look at my bank statement once in a while?

The unthinkable has happened.

Yesterday, while at work, I noticed that I had 4 missed cell phone calls from my parents' house. I initially thought that: a) my mother had some sage life wisdom to give me (i.e. "You seem a little down lately. Maybe you should go tanning.") ; b) my father had to inform me which seinfeld episode was on, complete with a quote ("Well you know, 80% of rickshaw businesses fail within the first six months." "We should have gotten some collateral from him. Like his bag of cans. Or his...other bag of cans.") ; or c) my sister had to tell me that she shut her finger in the microwave (which she actually did the other night.)

So I called my house, ready to tell them to quit bothering me, because I was working hard selling running shoes to the population of Brookline. What my sister told me, however, was slightly frightening.

"The bank called. They said there's a problem with your account and you have to call them as soon as possible."

Problem with my account? I knew I had plenty of money in there. My mind scanned all the possible options and settled on one: MARSHALLS. My card must have been compromised because of the TJX Cos. security breach. I did shop at Marshalls basically five days a week when I was on co-op, as I told you in an earlier post.

I called the Reading Co-operative Bank and they informed me that my debit/credit card was on a hot list because it had been seriously compromised (no doubt because of my overzealous bargain shopping). The woman informed me that all the cards on the list have been de-activated, and can only be used at an ATM where you have to input a PIN number to get money. I won't receive a new card for a couple weeks, and because of my class and work schedule, have no time to go to Reading to pick up a temporary card. My Citizen's Bank debit card has like 150 bucks on it, so I guess I'm shutting down my shopping operations for a couple weeks. How horrifying!

If anything, this has taught me that as an avid shopper, I should probably open my monthly bank statements and review them. My current system involves me piling the envelopes on my desk at home. And that's it. I don't look at them, I just assume that everything is status quo. I should probably grow up. But just a little bit.

I know you all care about my life so very much, so I'm sure what I have just written is more than enough to satiate you. But just in case you're still hungry, here's a Boston Herald article about this whole fiasco.