(For those of you who are unfamiliar with my use of quotations to signify irony, see this post on the subject.)

During about the fifth inning of last night’s game against the Twins, I received the following e-mail from a friend.  A friend from whom I probably haven’t heard since late ’08:  “Do you realize my twins r crushing ur Yankees?”

As you can imagine, I was in no mood to be trifled with and responded the only way I knew how.  I shamed him:  “Do you realize it’s a little bit gauche to contact someone for the first time in months JUST to rub that information in her face?”

Somewhere around the ninth, he writes back: “Oh, man.  I spoke too soon.  Btw, what does ‘gauche’ mean? I’m from minnie…we don’t know such east coast terms.” (Notice his transparent attempt to make himself look adorable in order to earn my forgiveness with his allusion to the Midwest.)

To this, I replied: “Gauche — from the french — lacking in social grace.  Know what hubris means?”