My wife, whose interest in sports pretty much begins and ends with the Westminster Dog Show, was wondering at lunch early this week about the Super Bowl. After noting the suspicious lack of pre-extravaganza hype on morning television ("usually they're on every day showing you how to cook chili"), she...

The catastrophe of losing your life savings and the daily struggle to go on afterward is almost never material for literature or movies. The big con con is a narrative thing of beauty in the right hands, but the curtain usually falls before we view the consequences.

The damage...