NEVER AN INOPPORTUNE TIME TO TALK ABOUT INSURANCE; BIRTHDAY GREETING TIED TO BIOLOGICAL CLOCK.

Byline: Dennis McCarthy

Happy birthday, John. Here's that death benefit information you didn't request.

Ah, you gotta love those insurance companies. They don't miss a beat, even on a guy's birthday.

Most people get Hallmark cards on their birthday. John Detwiler, who turned 55 last Wednesday, got a card from the Globe Life and Accident Insurance Co. of Oklahoma containing death benefit information.

``Now that was sure a birthday card that cheered me up,'' Detwiler said Monday. ``Couldn't they wait a couple of days to throw a damp towel on a guy turning 55?''

Nope, apparently not. Not when there's a buck to be made in the good, old life and death insurance game.

For $1, this company promised to send Detwiler an estimate on how much it would cost him to purchase life insurance for the rest of his miserable, short life, which, in case he hadn't noticed, was getting miserably shorter with every passing birthday.

Gee, thanks for the reminder, guys. Those of us in the higher-premium bracket hadn't noticed.

``I think these offers are callously calculated to arrive on your birthday when age and mortality is center on your mind,'' Detwiler said, laughing. A little.

For the record, he's feeling just fine, and has no intention of buying more life insurance.

As for the death benefit birthday card, it wound up in the trash can right next to the dirty paper plates and birthday wrapping paper.

A few weeks ago, I wrote a column about the Los Angeles Unified School District dunning an ex-employee for $159.86 the district overpaid him in sick time he hadn't worked long enough to earn.

It was sick time Stephen Kanter had used to be with his dying mother in Albuquerque, N.M., during the last few months of her life.

When he returned to L.A., the school district handed him a bill, not a condolence card.

Well, guess what? The school district screwed up. Amazing, huh?

A check of its records after the column ran showed that Kanter had, in fact, been underpaid by the district during his short, one-year teaching career.

``Because I had resigned before the end of the school year to be with my mother, the district hadn't correctly figured out my annualized pay,'' Kanter said Monday.

``They actually owed me money, and wound up sending me a check for $410.59,'' he said.

Officials in the school district's crack payroll division confirmed the, uh, oversight.