I'm no numismatist, but I do like coins. Of all the humble, ordinary objects that are a part of our everyday existence, they are among my favorites. I enjoy the jangle of change in my pocket, the durable thinness of a dime, the palpable heft of a quarter, the smooth circumference of a nickel, the tiny visage of Lincoln's statue within its memorial on the reverse of a penny. I take comfort in their familiar ubiquity, their inevitable presence scattered along the tops of dressers, loitering within desk drawers, and accumulating in every tray and compartment between the driver and passenger seat. The jaded among us cast spare change aside as though its monetary worth were its only value, but small children, unhampered by experience, will treasure a penny as a highly desirable object. There is a primal satisfaction in the possession of these virtually indestructible metal tokens with their perfectly circular shapes and curious iconography.

As I said, I'm no numismatist, but I have collected coins. If the uniformity of our solid currency has ever appealed to you, then you might also have found yourself attracted to that shelf in the hobby store with the assortment of deep blue Official Whitman Coin Folders. Each trifold portfolio of sturdy cardboard contains a matrix of paper-backed holes labeled by date, mint initial, and the number of millions that were produced. Unlike other historical chronologies, the Whitman Coin Folder is unencumbered by interpretation or nuance. It is truly nonpartisan. Everything has its own little place, and that's that. And well before the popular preoccupation with video games and their motivating multilevels, these collector's folders hooked the anal retentive with visions of completeness. The rows and rows of holes are just begging to be filled with their corresponding coins.

Whitman makes coin folders for just about every piece of domestic change that ever saw the inside of a cash register, but simple economics dictated that I could have a lot more fun by starting with the Lincoln Head Cent portfolios and working my way up from there. Right away, when you take one of those penny folders home, you get a lot of bang for your buck. A lot of holes can be filled by simply sifting through every household crevice and container that has accepted change over the years. My initial enthusiasm was fueled by just such a scavenger mission. The second stage is a little more work but nevertheless frequently rewarding, and it consists of closely examining all monetary exchanges for needed coins. I plugged quite a few folder holes doing that. Eventually, however, one reaches an equilibrium that reinforces the concept of rarity. Generally, though not always, the older the coin, the rarer the find.

Every time I completed a previously unfilled year, it brought a tingle of excitement. 1943, with its silvery wartime steel pennies, was especially rewarding, an island of cool, gray stoicism in a sea of common copper. But longer and longer intervals stretched between such finds. This is the point, I believe, that separates the numismatic novice from the true hobbyist. Are you willing to go beyond simply searching through spare change and start paying far more than face value for the coins you need to complete your collection? I pondered that question when I had time to kill at the local mall, wandering off to a lonely wall aisle of Woolworth and perusing its automated coin case. A couple dozen rectangular trays were arranged like Ferris wheel cars around a rotating drum. Customers could press buttons to light up the cabinet and bring the tray of their choice to the top of the case for closer examination. I thought it was great, and I frittered away many minutes familiarizing myself with the Woolworth collection.

Sooner or later, every penny collector yearns for a coin from 1909, the first year Lincoln head cents were produced. 72.7 million were produced without mint initials, by far the easiest variety to find. 28 million were struck with the letters VDB in recognition of the coin's designer, Victor D. Brenner. Merely 1.8 million carried just the letter S, the mark of the San Francisco mint. But a scant half million combined the San Francisco designation with Brenner's intials. Today, a 1909 S-VDB penny in fine condition is valued at $1,000. Yes, that's one thousand dollars. Stop and think about that for a moment. Just over a hundred years ago, plenty of people were walking around with one or more of these pennies in their pockets. Little did they know that had they merely kept it in a safe, dry place, that penny would have skyrocketed to one hundred thousand times its face value over the next century!

I can't remember whether the 1909 Lincoln head penny in that Woolworth case was an S-VDB or the much more common VDB variety (now valued at a quite affordable $13.50 in fine condition), but I do recall marveling at its presence and shaking my head at its unattainable price. Really, when you're a kid who's used to filling your collection at almost no cost, it almost doesn't matter whether a collectible is merely expensive or absurdly expensive. Either way, it's out of reach, at least when the price of a rare penny is as good as a whole lot of candy, comic books and baseball cards. I was destined to avoid serious numismatics.

Kid that I was, though, I found an affordable alternative that appealed to me nearly as much as the true rarity. True collectors would no doubt disregard it as a crass item of little to no value, but I thought it was cool. I pressed the button for customer service. There in the same row as the expensive 1909 coin was a novelty penny that had just been minted in 1981. Someone had struck it a second time, leaving an impression of the Liberty Bell etched within the tight space between Lincoln's nose and the perimeter of the coin. It couldn't have set me back more than a couple bucks. I took my treasure home, opened my Official Whitman Coin Folder, and pressed the altered penny into one of the empty holes marked VARIETIES.

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Instant funny.

Traffic was backed up for four miles on the southbound lanes of I-35 near Huxley, Iowa on Tuesday afternoon as crews labored to clean up a spilled semitrailer load of Jell-O pudding cups. Meanwhile, a mere 25 miles away, former Jell-O spokesman Bill Cosby was a featured speaker at the Get Motivated "business seminar" in Des Moines. These are indisputable facts, and for some reason, they are funny. Even the Associated Press coverage of the accident, which mentioned neither the brand name Jell-O nor the nearby presence of Cosby, was amusing, mainly due to the line "Pudding cups littered the interstate." The heart of the matter is this: a pudding spill is funny.

Of course, it is unlikely that the semi driver has joined the chorus of chuckles. Although he escaped uninjured, he did endure the harrowing experience of driving down the highway and suddenly discovering that his trailer was on fire. After pulling over to the berm and detaching his cab, he awaited the arrival of emergency crews while his trailer became engulfed in flames. His cargo spilled from the side of the trailer onto the roadway. Far from being amused, the driver was likely grateful to be alive while overwhelmed by the practical implications of the incident. What was the cause of the accident? Who, if anyone, was responsible? Were the trailer and its contents insured? What needs to be done next? Meanwhile, I doubt that cleanup crews found much levity in the unenviable task of removing the mess while impatient motorists backed up mile after mile.

And yet, the pudding bit is funny, at least to the detached observer with no stake in the matter. As Mel Brooks famously observed, "Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you walk into an open sewer and die." A comic exaggeration, to be sure, but it helps to explain the critical role of perspective in perceiving humor. Had anyone been seriously injured or killed, certainly a probable outcome of such an incident, the funniness would have evaporated for most of us, sociopaths excepted. On the other hand, if a responding police officer had sped to the scene and consequently engaged in an ultimately harmless series of 360-degree spins in a quarter-mile pudding skid, we would all be LOL-ing at the viral YouTube footage.

Just hours before the Iowa pudding debacle, a semi truck passing near Dayton, Ohio along I-75 jack-knifed and hit a bridge wall. Its driver was uninjured, but approximately 100 gallons of diesel fuel were spilled into the Great Miami River. Nothing funny here, just a minor environmental tragedy, a lot of inconvenienced motorists, and one lucky truck driver. However, had the trailer been loaded with commercial tubs of Jell-O instant pudding, the contents of which had spilled into the river and whipped the Great Miami into a chocolaty froth, we would all be having our days lightened by grinning co-anchors teasing the story with, "And finally, can you say Jell-NO?"

So when it comes to potentially lethal spills of cargo on the highway, the perceived danger of that cargo is inversely proportional to the humor. Diesel fuel is harmful in nearly every circumstance other than safely burning it as fuel, and therefore it is not funny. Jell-O pudding, however, is tasty, fun, harmful only to the waist, and carries that mirthful Cosby connotation, and therefore it is worthy of a giggle in all but the most extraordinary situations.

Beyond the cargo, though, it also helps one find the funny if the mishap doesn't happen to you. Years ago I was driving home through Columbus on 315, traveling south along what is known among local traffic reporters as "the hospital curve" because of its proximity to Riverside Methodist. Ahead of me in the center lane was a pickup truck with an unsecured wheelbarrow in its bed. Luckily I was maintaining a good bit of distance between us, arguably a lifesaving factor when the wheelbarrow suddenly rose like a kite and clattered onto the pavement. It was one of those adrenaline-filled moments when there is no time to think and just the barest window within which to respond instinctively. I swerved into the next lane without so much as a glance to check for traffic, and thankfully no one was driving in that space. Having narrowly missed a collision with the wheelbarrow, I continued along the highway with a pounding heart and mounting anger at the rubes whose irresponsibility put lives in jeopardy.

Now, it really would not have made any difference to me had that pickup been filled with pudding cups, a case of diapers, or a full load of bananas. Even if these bozos had dropped a shipment of inflatable Brutus Buckeyes and E. Gordon Gee bobbleheads, I would have perceived nothing more than an imminent threat to my safety, and that is not funny. Although I must admit, I can laugh at the thought of my obituary reading, "felled by an airborne bobblehead of E. Gordon Gee." But then I wouldn't be around to tee-hee about it, would I?

It's a fine line, then. Werribee, a small town in Melbourne, Australia, had a cow spill on the very same day as the Iowa pudding spill and Ohio diesel fuel spill. The driver had minor shoulder injuries. Unfortunately, some of the forty cows were killed, and others were injured. Obviously not funny. Had all living creatures escaped unscathed and oncoming drivers were merely inconvenienced by a herd of confused cows, though, we could all have a laugh about it.

A couple days earlier, traffic on the Trans-Canada highway near Sintalua, Saskatchewan was halted by a truck crash and its consequent spill of lobster tails. Minor injuries to the driver and a passenger. Mildly funny due to the incongruity of lobster tails on the roadway.

There were no injuries near Jonesville, Indiana on April 19 when 20,000 pounds of chicken manure were spilled onto Indiana 11. Funny. Not to anyone involved in the cleanup, of course, but otherwise funny.

And then there was the April 30 incident on northbound I-65 outside of Columbus, Indiana. A crash resulted in a semi spilling its load of peanut butter. According to Central Indiana CBS affiliate WISH-TV, "Bartholomew County Sheriff's officials said peanut butter was spread on the roadway for about an eighth of a mile."

Now that's funny.

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Priceless proof in the absence of memory.

My paternal grandfather died at the age of 86 when I was twelve years old. Given the fact that he lived just around the next block during the entire time I knew him, it seems only natural that I would have many memories of our brief time together. Yet, sadly, I cannot recall any specific moments that we shared. I only remember what it was like to sit quietly in his tiny living room when Dad and I would stop by for a visit. The two of them would drone on about topics that did not interest me at all, and I would pass the time by rocking in a swivel chair and scanning the latest National Enquirer that had been left on the end table. Sometimes there would be something interesting on the TV, but most often not.

I can only remember Grandpa as a mysterious and taciturn widower, Grandma having died when I was six. He did not live alone, though, as he had a faithful dachshund named Gidget for companionship. A highlight of visiting Grandpa, one might think. But as much as I found my grandfather to be remote, his little dog was completely unapproachable. Apparently she had once suffered abuse at the hands of youngsters, rendering her hostile toward anyone who happened to be in the same peer group as her former tormentors. Between Grandpa's perpetual frown and his vicious wiener dog, I didn't care to linger when we visited.

Not that there weren't subtle signs that there was far more to this man than his introverted nature suggested. The white tank top undershirts he favored in summertime revealed a faded rose tattoo, a real curiosity in an age when getting inked was a badge of nonconformity. I tried not to stare at it, just as I averted my eyes from his hand that was missing half of its pinkie finger. For many years I mistakenly believed that it had been mangled in a train coupling. Lord knows where I got the idea, as the dull truth was that Grandpa had simply got his finger caught in a factory machine press. Perhaps my brain just embellished the romantic character that started to form in my mind as I grew older and heard tales of my late grandfather.

Raising half a dozen kids during the 20's and 30's could not have been easy, and Grandpa did whatever he could to make ends meet. Most famously, desperate for a job to support his family, he managed to secure a job as a typing instructor despite the fact that he did not know how to type. How he got the job remains a mystery, but he apparently managed to bluff his way through the obligation by a regimen of self-instruction that kept him one lesson ahead of his students. During another lean period, he was literally down to his last dollar, which he gambled on a tip book from a bar. Amazingly, the investment paid off handsomely enough to get him by.

I learned that he eventually was a successful seller of cemetery plots, a somewhat ghoulish profession for which he was once rewarded with a tie tack in the shape of a shovel. He had a spotlight mounted to his car in order to find house numbers while canvassing neighborhoods in the evening. Somehow the very idea evokes the melodrama of an old EC horror comic book. I can only guess that anyone who could manage to make a living persuading people to open their doors at night and buy a cemetery plot must have been born to sell.

I found out that against all stereotypes, it was Grandpa who cooked breakfast for my father when he was young, setting a hot plate and a steaming mug of coffee before his youngest child every morning. I laughed at the story of Grandpa's ire upon finding his car blocked by a double-parked vehicle, which he subsequently removed by starting his own automobile and pushing the obstacle out of the way. But I'm glad I wasn't around to see the legendary poker night when he is said to have expressed his disgust at a bad game by hauling all of the gambling paraphernalia down to the basement and tossing it into the coal furnace. I am told that one of my cousins possesses evidence of the incident by way of a collection of singed poker chips.

So much I could have asked him, if only I had grown a bit older before he died. But we never had a whole lot to say to each other, or at least that's how I remember it. For the longest time, well into my adulthood, I had the impression that I was barely noticed by Grandpa. I was, after all, the last of his twenty-two grandchildren, and surely the novel thrill of grandfatherhood must have worn off by then. But then I found a trio of letters, written to me during his annual wintering with my aunts and uncles in California, that tell a different story. Perhaps he never did say much to me in person - maybe he never felt comfortable doing so - but he took the time to put into written words the very things that any grandchild would want to hear:

San Diego, Calif.

Jan. 8, 1977

Dear Bobby:

I liked your letter with the drawing of a ten dollar bill. Did you deposit your Christmas money in the bank?

I'll bet you received a number of nice gifts on Christmas Day. Did you get a sled? I hear that Lima has been getting a lot of snow, so a sled will be a lot of fun.

I wish you could be with me when I take my walks along the ocean. There are many big ships coming and going, and also many jet passenger planes and Navy planes. Many people take their lunches with them and either lay in the sun or go bathing, and the children play in the sand.

There has been a lot of snow in the mountains, and a lot of parents take their children up there to play in it.

I will look for another letter from you soon.

A big hug and kiss for you, and love and best wishes to all.

Grandpa

P.S. I ma learning to use Norma's new electric typewriter, so please excuse mistakes.

Have you made any more plans to capture Bigfoot?

How funny it is for me to read that letter today. I don't even remember writing letters to Grandpa, which I'm guessing I might have done only at my parents' urging. Why I would have drawn a ten-dollar bill is beyond me. I do, however, recall my boyhood fascination with Bigfoot. I took it for granted that he was real, and I once detailed how I might take him captive with the aid of Dad, Grandpa, and the hostile hound Gidget. I am certain that Grandpa's dry humor went right over my head when I first read his letters.

San Diego, Ca

Dec. 14, 1977

Dear Bobby,

I enjoyed your nice letter and the interesting drawings. Thanks a lot for the Christmas seals.

We went to Richard's house in Oceanside last Sunday, and Gidget was very happy to see me. She is a lot of company for Richard, and he will hate to give her up when I return to Lima.

Richard and Dave and Lee Ann and their kids are coming for a week in San Diego, and we will be at Lee Ann's parents home for Christmas dinner.

I hope you will get everything you want for Christmas.

I read in the newspaper that Bigfoot has been seen in Oregon. I will watch for any more news about him, and let you know. It does not seem likely that he will be in Ohio until about next summer.

Glad that you like the snow. People with children drive up in the high mountains here and bring snow home in the trunks of their cars. Rather silly, I think.

Thanks a lot for the Christmas seals.

Write again real soon.

Love and best wishes,

Grandpa

P.S. You are a very good letter writer.

Why, that isn't the Grandpa I remember visiting! How could I have read words like those and so quickly forgotten them? But then I was quite young, too young too see the humor and too unsophisticated to appreciate how carefully my grandfather had written in a style that was easy for me to understand. The thought that he took the time to write when he could have spent a few more moments relaxing in sunny California would never have occurred to me.

The last letter, written within two years of his death, reflects a change in tone. Grandpa recognized that I was a little more grown up, being ten and all, and perhaps it was time to address me differently. He still, however, took delight in providing me with Bigfoot updates.

San Diego, Calif

March 12, 1979

Dear Bob:

I enjoyed your recent letter and am glad you are doing well in school, even tho you do not like it too well. It is best to have a good education.

It looks like bad weather is about over in Lima, and you can have a lot of fun with your bike. Are you going to play ball this summer?

The last I heard about Bigfoot, he was seen somewhere in Idaho. If he ever comes to Ohio, we will put Gidget on his trail.

We took a long ride in the mountains yesterday. Many wonderful things to see.

I have reservations for my trip home on the 7th of April. Will be happy to get back.

Love and best wishes to all,

Grandpa

I regret that I never knew Grandpa better, but I am very grateful to have the letters that he wrote to me so long ago. Not only do they prove to me that my grandfather did, indeed, have great affection for me, but they also provide me with a valuable lesson. It's always a good investment of time to put your love of others into writing. You never know when those words will communicate what you no longer can.

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The forlorn, former home of Cans 'n' Stuff

The street on which I was raised runs nearly three quarters of a mile, a straight line along its entire length. We lived almost dead center, whence I could pedal my bike a satisfying distance in either direction. On the west end of the avenue lived Big Ed and Little Ed, a father and son whose nicknames reflected their seniority but not their relative size. Big Ed, as I recall, was a quiet, gray-haired man of small stature. Little Ed, however, was bigger in every way, from his large frame to his frizzy, black hair, which framed a happy-go-lucky countenance. They would have been an odd couple under any circumstances, but for a brief period of time they were business partners. They ran their unique venture from a tiny and disheveled storefront at the eastern terminus of our street.

Cans 'n' Stuff was surely one of the stranger establishments to have emerged in my hometown. Its eclectic stock was an outgrowth of its proprietors' respective hobbies. Big Ed collected beer cans, a fad of rising popularity in the seventies. Little Ed collected record albums, singles and related memorabilia. Naturally, they opened a shop that sold used records and beer cans. It was, perhaps, one of the greatest moments in the history of entrepreneurial zeal executed without so much as a shred of market research. What, after all, was the target demographic of Cans 'n' Stuff? Whom did Big Ed and Little Ed envision as their customers?

Herein was a lovely irony, for it so happened that, despite the presumably limited appeal of Cans 'n' Stuff, the quirky endeavor held great appeal to another pair who lived smack in between the Eds and their silly shop: my father and me. I don't know that Dad and I had a whole lot in common with Big Ed and Little Ed, but we did share their peculiar elder/younger - beer can/record album preoccupation dynamic. Imagine, a little bit of father-son heaven opening up right at the end of your street. I was too young to recognize its improbability. I just knew I liked it, and so did Dad.

Long before the term man cave was admitted to the popular lexicon, Dad had created a peaceful refuge of sorts in a corner of our unfinished basement. A work bench sat under the darkened window that use to look out over the back yard before its view was obstructed by the crawlspace of our addition. Plenty of illumination was provided by a hanging bank of fluorescent lights. Though the furnace, water heater and fuse box surrounded the space, Dad added little touches of manly decor that made his "workshop" comfortable. He nailed old license plates to the exposed floor beams and taped calendar images of faraway places to the sides of storage boxes. Stacks of National Geographic and Popular Mechanics filled a utility shelf. And somewhere along the way, Dad decided to paint the wooden shelves affixed to the upper half of the foundation walls a vibrant orange. Within these eye-popping display units he assembled his beer can collection.

"Someday," Dad was fond of intoning as he gestured toward his collection with a sweep of his hand, "this will all be yours, son." It took me a few years to discern his wonderfully dry and gentle sense of humor. He never took his hobby seriously, although it is true that some of the rarities he possessed had the potential to escalate in value. As was the custom among collectors, Dad's cans appeared to be full, their pull-tab tops unmolested, but their concealed undersides had puncture holes that allowed for the draining and enjoyment of their contents. For my father, half of the pleasure of a beer can collection was the opportunity to try new beers, and the other half was derived from the colorful and often amusing packaging art. Any monetary value was just icing on the cake. Or perhaps foam on the beer.

Among the more memorable brands I recall was Olde Frothingslosh, a tongue-in-cheek product of Pittsburgh Brewing Company featuring Iron City Beer in a series of novelty cans emblazoned with retro cheesecake portraits of the hefty Miss Olde Frothingslosh. From the same brewery came Hop'n Gator, a lemon-lime flavored beer said to be inspired by a mixture of suds and Gatorade. Dad also had the requisite can of Billy Beer, the shameless self-exploitation of President Jimmy Carter's notoriously backwoods and beer-swilling caricature of a brother. Alongside a beer calendar and a festive St. Pauli Girl poster, the collection added a cheery touch of whimsy to the otherwise drab basement. On many evenings, Dad could be found contentedly puttering away down there to the tinny sound of a baseball game or classical music on his portable radio.

Meanwhile, I was starting to look beyond the records I had found in the house and began exploring my own musical interests. Little Ed, long admired by me since the days he had been a jaunty high school chum of my big sister Diane, graciously heralded the opening of Cans 'n' Stuff by presenting me with a promotional gift: an 8x10 black-and-white glossy of the Ed Sullivan Show-era Beatles and a 45 of the KISS standard Rock and Roll All Nite. Unsophisticated as I was, I quietly disregarded the photo while prizing the single, which I errantly spun on my turntable at 33 and 1/3. Having only seen yet never heard KISS, the resulting monstrous sludge that thudded from my speakers seemed credible enough, bizarre as it was.

Soon Cans 'n' Stuff became a regular destination for Dad and me. Big Ed and Little Ed must have loved it when we walked through the door. Fathers and sons enjoyed a few moments of enthusiastic talk about fields of interest that seemed to captivate no one else. In fact, I do not remember ever seeing another customer in the shop, though surely it must have attracted its share of curious passers-by. Perhaps I was always too occupied by the business at hand. Dad and Big Ed chatted about cans while Little Ed promised to keep an eye out for the records I coveted. We always left a few cans and albums richer.

In the end, however, our occasional patronage could not sustain the short life of Cans 'n' Stuff. I can't imagine it ever turned a profit. But for an all-too-brief season, Dad and I knew a place down the street that seemed like it had been created just for us. Big Ed and Little Ed, your business may not have succeeded in the traditional sense, but you certainly were a hit with us. Even now, I smile to think of the time we spent idly perusing your bygone establishment. And believe it or not, we still have those records and cans.

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For years, Brian and I had little to say to each other due to the icy chasm of our eight years difference in age. We had few common interests, after all. Not until I reached adolescence did our cold war start to thaw, a more or less civil diplomacy emerging in the unlikeliest of venues: on the virtual football fields, baseball diamonds and tennis courts of pioneering Intellivision video games. It was my older brother, who followed sports and occasionally actually played them, versus his nonathletic and sports-illiterate sibling in highly competitive contests of manual dexterity and hand-eye coordination. Countless battles unfolded on the color screen of our wood-paneled console television as we stretched out on the living room floor and blindly manipulated the controllers, keeping our wide eyes locked on the action.

Sometimes we were woefully mismatched, as when we faced off in football. Clearly Brian had the far better grasp of strategy. I had only one effective weapon in my pitiful strategic arsenal, a potentially devastating play that I called The 9929 Twenty-Yard Fadeback. Named for the four-digit code one entered into the controller to call a play that included a receiver going long, the scheme exploited a curious anomaly of Intellivision Football: its quarterbacks never threw too short nor tossed the ball out of bounds, instead firing off passes that would spiral all the way off the scrolling screen if they were not caught. By some strange compromise of gameplay design, those golden arms could accurately throw the length of the football field.

The 9929 worked like a charm, provided that I could entice a prolonged rush. I simply ran my quarterback twenty yards backward, made sure Brian wasn't in between me and my offscreen receiver, and let 'er rip. One 80-yard pass later, my isolated receiver would dash alone into the end zone. Unstoppable if you didn't see it coming. Of course, it soon became impossible for me to entice Brian into a prolonged rush. As soon as my quarterback retreated more than five yards, my brother was on the alert to abandon the rush and intercept the ol' 9929. I don't think I ever won a single game of football.

I fared much better in baseball, which required no strategic decision-making beyond deciding what kind of pitch to throw and when to swing the bat. The rest was all reflexive. If you had the chops to instantly activate any of your fielders by touch, then you were as good as anybody. Consequently, neither of us dominated in baseball. Brian would win one, then I would win one, all to the primitive, 8-bit approximation of an umpire growling Yer Out!, which actually sounded more like some sort of digital belch.

It was tennis, though, that brought out our most intense competition. We were bitter rivals on the court, and if a sportscaster had sought a narrative suitable for dramatizing our struggle, it would have been the underdog story of the little brother who won games against big brother but never managed to take a set. Serve after serve, back and forth the advantage went, yet Brian inevitably emerged triumphant.

As the older brother, Brian usually took the high road even in the heat of battle. However, he was not above ragging his opponent when necessary, nor was I above being rattled by it. Most unfortunately, I could never match his intimidation, and he knew it. If his circumstances ever turned desperate, he could recover lost ground by shrewdly hammering away at my psyche. This was the situation he found himself in one afternoon when I made the unprecedented personal accomplishment of winning the first four games of a set. It was time for Brian to bring the mental heat.

"Thankyousomuch!" was his first volley, a smugly delivered rush of syllables that he let loose with an icy smile after winning a point. I didn't even know that I was being messed with at that point, focused as I was on continuing my streak in order to win a set for the first time ever. A few plays later, I heard it again. Thankyousomuch! And here I made a colossal mistake. I gave my opponent a sidelong glance that conveyed my annoyance. I might as well have slathered my leg with beef broth and kicked a junkyard dog. It was all the provocation he needed.

Now that he knew I was irritated by his new verbal tic, it was time to take the intimidation to a new and lower level. He waited until I made an error, somehow failing to return a ball that was hit right to me. Thankyousomuch! He was taking credit for my mistake! I was incensed, yet little did I know that my fury was the beginning of the end. While I fought harder and harder to keep my advantage, Brian was pulverizing the foundation blocks of my mental game. He knew what he was doing, but I couldn't see it. I turned to him and unleashed a torrent of protest that was mere fuel for the fire.

"Oh, come on! I made a stupid mistake! You didn't win that point, I lost it!"

Brian just flashed a Chesire Cat grin and chuckled, and his complete lack of remorse only deepened my indignation. I was already off my game, but I lacked the maturity to compose myself and see my lead through to victory. He won the game, then another, and though he should have been the one sweating bullets, I was the one who felt like I had everything to lose. My play became sloppier. I missed more points that should have been mine. Brian took another game. I flailed about under the fear of what had the potential to be my most embarrassing loss ever. I made another stupid mistake, and then Brian let loose another one of his infernal proclamations of Thankyousomuch!

"Thankyousomuch! Thankyousomuch!" I blurted out in exasperation. Brian said nothing but began to laugh gleefully. "It doesn't even mean anything anymore!" He clutched his side and vibrated with mirth at my outburst. "You might as well be saying..." I grasped furtively for random words, "...tablechair!" My brother roared with laughter, but I was serious. He was about to get a taste of his own medicine.

The first chance I got, I unleashed my lethal non sequitur. Gloating over an ace, I attempted an ironic smile and vindictively whispered, "Tablechair!" This tactic failed to achieve its desired effect. Far from being intimidated, my brother was merely amused. He knew the set was his. I was clearly self-destructing. He could have remained silent for the rest of the set and won without further provocation.

But its hard for an aggressor to resist another twist of the knife, especially when he finds it funny. As so Brian stopped saying Thankyousomuch! every time I made a mistake. Instead, he said Tablechair!

Brian won the set, 6-4.

Shameful? Perhaps. But as John Lyly observed over four hundred years ago, "The rules of fair play do not apply in love and war." Never was it more true than on the virtual battlefield of brotherly rivalry we called Intellivision Tennis.

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I am sitting by the front windows at a table adorned with a small vase of fresh-cut daisies and miniature yellow roses, clacking away at my laptop while sipping from a large mocha espresso. It is mid-morning, well after the breakfast rush and still more than an hour away from the onset of the lunch crowd, yet there has been no scarcity of customers. An ebullient woman dressed as a skeleton and a cocky guy in the garb of a Mardi Gras king are competing for the approval of the audience as Let's Make A Deal unfolds on a flat-screen display. No one pays any attention to the spectacle, though, its raucous proceedings muffled by the general din of conversation and an industrious, cheery staff.

The dining area is a collage of browns, beiges and oranges, offset with bold murals of modern art featuring swaths of black and white, red and yellow, and a high-contrast, monochromatic portrait of a young woman of ambiguous expression staring upward as her negatively silhouetted hand cradles a photorealistic hamburger. Behind the counter is an even more aggressive design scheme: yard-long, rectangular backsplash panels in adjoining fields of midnight black and fire engine red. A light wood grain laminate dominates not only the floor but the walls as well. Unobtrusive lighting recessed within acoustical ceiling tile illuminates a variety of seating options, from a long, tall, wooden table flanked by a dual row of upholstered bar stools to a series of white fiberglass tables adjacent to a long, cushioned bench that runs along the front of the room. It's a quirky mix of variety and uniformity, as though an interior decorator were given complete artistic freedom within severely defined constraints.

It's opening day for our newly renovated neighborhood McDonald's, the latest effort in a nationwide, billion-dollar corporate makeover designed to rebrand the chain from an outdated haven for Happy Meals to a comfortable hangout for the tablet-and-latte set. According to Business Insider, an average cost of just over half a million dollars per remodeled restaurant can be expected to raise sales by up to 7% in the first year with further gains in subsequent years. USA Today says that McDonald's has committed to the unprecedented investment with an aim to "quash its rivals, pry customers away from slightly pricier casual chains like Panera and Chipotle, and to begin cementing a new image of McDonald's in the minds of consumers."

Though I am personally skeptical about the degree to which a McDonald's renovation means anything at all to the average consumer, I cannot deny the enthusiasm that I observe emanating from some patrons. "It's so much bigger!" one woman gushes to her companions, venturing toward the perimeter of the dining area to confirm her suspicion of increased square footage. "Look! I'm standing where the patio was!" Apparently embarrassed, one of her entourage turns to another and quietly offers, "This is how we get on Fridays."

Another customer approaches the owner and reveals that her daughter was impatiently awaiting the grand reopening. "Look how happy she is," the mother indicates, adding her glowing assessment of the remodeled interior's beauty. I swear on Ray Kroc's grave that I am not fabricating this exchange.

Of course, I understand the attraction of McDonald's for young children. I am of the first generation of toddlers to have been wooed by the burger chain's successful McDonaldland advertising campaign, the bizarre series of commercials that emulated the work of Sid and Marty Krofft and introduced such memorable characters as Grimace and Mayor McCheese. I am told that I once barricaded myself in the bathroom, taking advantage of a design flaw that enabled anyone to simply open the counter drawers to prevent the door from being opened. For reasons unknown, I refused to come out despite the patient pleading of my parents. Apparently I was finally persuaded to abandon the standoff when Dad promised to reward my compliance with a trip to McDonald's. I'm not sure what the moral of the story is (probably not a good one), but I think my estimation of McDonald's was similar to that of many children at the time. Those golden arches supported a powerfully positive connotation.

My wife and I continued the tradition by taking our daughters to McDonald's when they were very young. They liked the food and loved the play areas, a winning formula that guaranteed a good time at minimal expense.

And there is something to be said for consistency. One of the redeeming virtues of McDonald's is that you can walk into one practically anywhere and know precisely what you're going to get. If you happen to have a craving for the unique flavoring and texture of, say, a Big Mac, you are not going to be disappointed.

But I do wonder if I would be totally ambivalent to the food McDonald's sells if only my brain were not hardwired to associate it with the happiness of my childhood and that of my children. Sure, the fries can be pretty tasty, provided they have been culled from a fresh batch. But have you ever made a hamburger that was even remotely like any of the billions sold by McDonald's? That curious mixture of meat, condiments and bun is so effortlessly digestible that you could lose all your teeth and still gum down a Quarter Pounder. It's unlike food I've consumed anywhere else, and that's a plus for McDonald's, because there is only one place to get it. I suspect that had I never entered a McDonald's until today, I would sample the menu and be appalled. But I have been conditioned to respond otherwise. I occasionally eat at a McDonald's and more often than not enjoy it.

Today, in fact, my espresso is merely an appetizer, allowing me time to soak in the new atmosphere and enjoy a couple hours of complimentary WiFi service before my wife joins me for lunch. Plus, I am curious to check out this new McDonald's philosophy of encouraging customers to linger, as patrons are accustomed to doing at Panera. True to their corporate word, no one hassles me for occupying my seat for so long. In fact, they seem nothing if not pleased to have me there. My wife arrives, and we both settle on the classic combination of a Big Mac and fries.

It is impossible for me to even think about a Big Mac without recalling my favorite piece of political correspondence. As related in Eric Schlosser's Fast Food Nation, Richard Nixon felt compelled to congratulate Ray Kroc upon trying a Big Mac in 1974:

One of the highlights of my sixty-first birthday celebration was when Tricia suggested we needed a 'break' on our drive to Palm Springs, and we turned in at McDonald's. I had heard for years from our girls that the 'Big Mac' was really something special, and while I've often credited Mrs. Nixon with making the best hamburgers in the world, we are both convinced that McDonald's runs a close second.

If only our late President could see the slippery glop that I hold vise-like with both hands now. Sure, it tastes good, in a McDonald's sort of way. The fries, alas, are not a fair representation of the best McDonald's has to offer. The staleness that sets upon them like french fry rigor mortis has already begun to lessen their appeal. Our surroundings are more pleasurable than the food we are eating.

We've all been there, I think. And in that sense, you've already been to one of the renovated McDonald's. Only the environment has been changed, not the food, and it remains to be seen whether a billion dollars worth of remodeling can persuade enough consumers to feel that the big,yellow M stands for more than Meh.

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Them Catholics sure know how to make themselves miserable, let me tell you. I know, 'cause I used to work with one. Fred Murphy, that was his name, he used to work down in the supply cage, only decent guy in the whole department. Everybody on the shop floor knew to go to Freddy if you needed something, 'cause he'd actually listen to you and do whatever he could to help. Maybe he couldn't always fix your problem, but he'd go to bat for you every time. I never knew anybody who didn't like Freddy, except maybe the old fart who used to run the supply cage like it was his kingdom and we were the serfs. Anyway, ol' Fred was a good guy.

Now we were all second shifters back then, including Fred, and somehow or other we started up a Friday morning bowling league. Might have been Mel Gordon's idea, he was a pretty good bowler before his heart attack. The rest of us were just in it for a good time, you know? Couple of beers, some greasy food, who cared about the score? It was a great way to unwind before the last shift of the week, and you knew the weekend was on the other side. Fred was kind of a quiet guy, not pushy at all, and it took awhile before someone thought to ask him to join our league, since it was all guys from the floor. But once he joined us, he never missed a Friday, not so long as the league lasted.

We were all glad to have Freddy with us, but it turned out he wasn't much of a bowler. He said he'd bowled before, but that might just be the only lie that Fred Murphy ever told. He was tossing more gutter balls than anything else for the first month or so. And we could tell he was reading some kind of bowling books or something, 'cause then he came up with his famous approach and started trying to spin the ball. It cracked us up, and we used to ride him about it, but ol' Fred, bless his heart, he was a real gentle guy, and he must have known we all liked him, 'cause it never seemed to bother him when we kidded him about his lousy bowling. He'd just smile and order another Dr. Pepper, never any beer for Freddy. And he'd be the first to slap a guy's hand for getting a strike. Real friendly guy, ol' Fred.

And as far as him being Catholic, you never would have known it, not like he ever talked about it, except he'd pick the pepperoni off his pizza on account of it being Friday. And he'd keep that smudge of ashes on his forehead from Ash Wednesday all day long, like it was a sin to wash it off or something. Other than that though, he kept his personal business to himself. He never acted like he was better than anybody else. He might not even have liked being Catholic, for all I know.

Anyway, one Friday morning we're putting on our shoes, and Bill Haller says, "Where's Freddy?" 'Cause Fred was always there before the rest of us for some reason. And I said, "I don't know, he didn't say nothing about it last night." And everybody knew Freddy never got sick, and he'd never missed our Friday league since the day he joined it. So we decide to wait a few minutes, you know, out of respect, and we toss back a round, and we're just about to start without him when we see Fred come through the door looking like he'd just lost his best friend. I mean, Freddy wasn't one of those guys who goes around looking happy all the time, but he was looking pretty grim.

So I say, "Freddy, what's wrong?" But he just shakes his head and doesn't say nothing, just puts on his shoes with this grim look on his face and drops his ball in the ball return like it's got germs on it. Well, by now, Mel Gordon's getting a little hot about having to wait so long to play, so we start the games and act like nothing's wrong. But we're all worried about Freddy, 'cause that wasn't like him at all. And then it's his turn, and he picks up his ball and goes right into his delivery, without so much as a second's look down the alley, and would you believe that ball has the perfect spin on it, and his first ball's a strike! We're giving each other high fives, none of us can believe it, and poor old Freddy just shuffles back to his seat and plops down without a word. Doesn't even want a Dr. Pepper. We can't figure it out.

Next ball he does the same thing as before, just grabs his ball and throws it down the lane in two seconds, and I'll be damned if he didn't get another strike. This has never happened before, and we're going crazy. "Freddy! Freddy! You're doing great, Freddy!" But it's like he couldn't care less, and it's starting to creep us out. I mean, what's wrong with this guy? But he won't say nothing, just stays slumped down in his seat staring at his shoes, and I figure there must be trouble at home, right? That would explain why he was late. Before I can ask him about it, though, it's his turn again, and this time he leaves a Woolworth split. Now, ordinarily, Freddy was about as good at picking up spares as he was at bowling strikes, which is to say not at all. But this time he pulls off a textbook spare without taking any more time to study the lane than he did before. And the guys are going bananas, 'cause they know Freddy has bowled entire games with a lower score than he's just picked up from his first three frames.

So I plop myself down next to Freddy to make him spill the beans. "Okay, Fred," I tell him, "out with it. You'll feel better if you tell somebody. You in the doghouse with Bev?" He doesn't want to talk, but I keep at him, and every so often he gets up and throws a strike or picks up a spare, never leaves a frame open. Unbelievable. And finally he cracks and tells me that Bev didn't want him to go bowling that morning, that he was almost out the door when she started giving him hell for going bowling.

And I say, "Wait a second, Freddy, this makes no sense. How long you been bowling with us now? You're telling me your old lady's just now figuring it out?" But Freddy says that's not it at all, and then he lays it on the line. Suddenly it all makes sense. The lateness. The haunted look on his face. The total lack of any joy from frame after frame of the best he's ever bowled. He tells me - get this - Bev didn't want him to go bowling because it was Good Friday, and it was a sin to enjoy yourself on purpose on Good Friday.

Can you believe that? And here I didn't even know it was Good Friday until Freddy told me, not like I would have cared one way or the other, but there you go. Not allowed to have a good time on Good Friday. What the hell's good about it, then, I want to ask him, but I got too much respect for Freddy to ride him for that. It just makes me sad, seeing him so glum and worried he's doing something awful just because he's doing what he does every other Friday, and it's not like he's not a hard worker or nothing like that. It also makes me kind of mad, because if that's what religion is, I tell myself, I don't want no part of it. Imagine, the best game a guy ever bowls, and he can't enjoy it. Freddy ends up with a 256, which is what he usually has to bowl three or four games and add up the scores together to get, and he goes off to work just as sour-faced as he came into the bowling alley. And the next week, he's his usual cheery self, and he's back to being a lousy bowler.

Some Good Friday, huh? But like I said, them Catholics, they know how to make themselves miserable.

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Kneeling at the altar where one day their children would be served tater tots.

A big cafeteria. That's what you need if you're planning on running an institution that teaches children from first through eighth grade. St. Gerard, my elementary and middle school alma mater, met that requirement with room to spare. As a little kid, our cafeteria seemed like a cavernous space, an immense and spare rectangular room so large that its flat and featureless ceiling was supported by more than half a dozen pillars. If the prospect of attending a school that included students twice your height and age didn't already make you feel small, being herded into the cafeteria for the first time erased any vestiges of pride.

For a hall that admitted plenty of sun through great windows along its length, the St. Gerard cafeteria was run with chilling efficiency. To this day, if I were to walk through its far entrance, I could show you the exact path that we were expected to follow as we wound along the perimeter in single file toward the serving area. There we would pick up the molded plastic trays upon which a small group of cafeteria ladies - some nice, others indifferent, and a few downright intimidating - would deposit the various components of the day's meal. We picked up our milk last, dutifully inserting the half-pint carton into its designated tray compartment, and proceeded toward the seating area.

That was where they assigned their sternest and stoutest personnel, I believe, no-nonsense disciplinarians whose directives would be followed without question. It was they who marshaled us down the farthest seating row until it was filled to capacity, then subsequent rows would be seated in like fashion. Due to this system, you always knew who would be sitting immediately to your left and right, but there was no telling who would be sitting across from you. Consequently, students tried to manipulate their place in the lunch line to ensure proximity to at least one friend, or else it could be a conversationally awkward lunch. If things turned out badly, you might even find yourself sitting opposite strange kids from the grade above you.

There was one day during one of my earliest years at St. Gerard when, through no fault of my own, I was detained at the beginning of the lunch period, thus preventing me from lining up with my peers. To my horror, I arrived at the cafeteria as the eighth graders were approaching the serving windows, leaving me no choice but to meekly take a spot at the end of their queue. The seating area matron ensured that I followed the conventional arrangement, and I spent that lunch staring down at my tray and wondering if the eighth graders were laughing at me, or maybe they always laughed at everything.

I recall being a fairly happy kid when I was very young, but somewhere along the line I endured a brief period of socially crippling neuroses that may have had their genesis in the St. Gerard cafeteria. To the adults in my life, it seemed absurd that I should worry about "getting in the wrong lunch line" at school, but the specter of total ostracism was a real and reasonable fear to me. Soon my paranoia was manifesting itself in truly irrational ways, leading me to such bizarre suspicions as the idea that my own breathing might not be involuntary, and if my respiration really did depend on a certain degree of consciousness, I might expire in my sleep on any given night. It was a challenging time for my poor parents.

Crazy or not, I was responding to an atmosphere that certainly had its oppressive qualities. For example, there was a total segregation of students who packed their lunches from those who purchased a school lunch. Why, I have no idea, except that to do otherwise might have thrown a wrench into the precision mechanism of the rigidly enforced seating system. Packers sat at a totally separate set of tables, and because they were only a small minority of the student body, there was a measure of pathos in their lonely uncrumpling of lunch bags. I felt sorry for them. I eventually befriended one of the packers in fifth grade, and though we became good friends outside of the cafeteria, we were destined to never share a lunch conversation.

Students were generously allowed seconds of certain items now and then, I imagine because of unintended surpluses. Generally they were dessert items like peanut butter bars or cookies. Midway through my St. Gerard career, in a rare moment of assertiveness coupled with an embarrassing misunderstanding of leftover distribution, I gratefully accepted some sort of confection and brazenly announced, "I'll have another one."

Teachers and other adults who work with children, remember to err on the side of caution when you suspect impertinence from your charges. A quick and kind explanation of why my request had to be denied would have sufficed, but the grizzled hag whom I addressed eyed me with the outrage of Dickens' Mr. Bumble regarding Oliver Twist begging for more gruel. "Oh no you won't!" she snapped, and my cheeks flushed with shame. Taking a cold seat at my assigned row, I silently vowed to never again phrase a request in such a presumptive manner.

Even if every adult who staffed the cafeteria had been as gentle and caring as Mr. Rogers, any kid can tell you that the greatest threat to one's well-being exists in the unpredictable actions of other kids. Stan Smithers put me off white milk for at least a year when he inexplicably picked his nose and deposited a morsel of snot into my open half-pint. I remember that he did this gleefully and without the slightest duplicity. He seemed to deeply enjoy the look of sheer revulsion and anger that I must have assumed upon witnessing his transgression. It took me a long time to get over it. Every time I raised a glass of milk to my lips, I couldn't help imagining a gooey, green glob floating invisibly within it.

Remarkably, I ate eight years worth of lunches in the St. Gerard cafeteria without ever knowing the profound personal significance of my surroundings. The space looked sterile and utilitarian at best to me, with one particularly garish wall upon which was mounted an electronic BINGO board. I was totally ignorant of the fact that our lunch tables rested where rows of pews were once bolted to the floor, that our trays were filled where an altar once stood, and that decades before we wolfed down tater tots, my parents had walked down an aisle between the pillars as a newly wedded couple. How was I to know that my home rooms through fifth grade were situated above and below the modest sanctuary where Mom and Dad were married? It never occurred to me that the building I knew as the church was not yet built when they attended St. Gerard.

I never found out about this fundamental piece of my own history until many years later. I wonder if it would have made a difference had I known the former sanctity of the space we called our cafeteria. Maybe it would have made that day with the eighth graders a little less scary. Perhaps I would have shrugged off the tart reprimand of Mrs. Bumble. And if only I had known that Stan Smithers was putting his snot in my milk in the very room where my parents had exchanged vows, I might have given the kid what he deserved.

That's right, Stan. I know you're out there, and I haven't forgotten. You might want to keep an eye on your milk.

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Growing up in the 70's, I heard my fair share of pop music, mostly as I dawdled over a bowl of cereal while our local AM radio station spun tunes in between news updates and weather forecasts. WIMA programmed an adult contemporary playlist that was as digestible at the breakfast table as it was suitable for dentists' offices. Songs like Feelings, Tie A Yellow Ribbon, Raindrops Keep Fallin' On My Head and Music Box Dancer were mixed with country crossover hits such as The Devil Went Down to Georgia and Southern Nights, all topped off with a liberal sprinkling of Bee Gees hits. From the dawn of disco to its twilight and shortly thereafter, WIMA also kept ABBA in heavy rotation.

I was familiar with ABBA because of their inclusion among the small stack of 45's I had inherited from my siblings. Brownsville Station's Smokin' in the Boys Room. Clint Holmes' Playground in My Mind. The Night Chicago Died by Paper Lace. Something had to go under the needle of my very first record player, and whatever I found around the house was added to the playlist. I still remember the red and black Atlantic Records label revolving as the low-fidelity strains of Waterloo warbled from built-in speakers. It was a happy and infectious tune, and although I had no idea what the song was about, I knew I liked the music. Like most of the ABBA hits that were destined to dominate the airwaves, Waterloo was so catchy that it was hard to forget. Hear it once, and you know it. Hear it twice, and it's stuck in your head.

So I guess you could say that I initially liked ABBA, even as more and more of their singles began to accompany my breakfast routine. Dancing Queen, The Name of the Game, Take a Chance on Me, and other chart-topping titles were the aural sugar that I swallowed along with bowls full of Cap'n Crunch and Cocoa Puffs. It was no worse - nor better - than the other radio fare that I crunched away to, from Muskrat Love to Forever in Blue Jeans. But as time went on, the unmistakable sound of ABBA became a little overbearing, much like disco itself. Even someone with a relentless sweet tooth like myself preferred a bowl of comparatively tame Life now and then. By the end of the decade, it seemed like we'd been listening to ABBA for a long time, and there was no end in sight. Was there no stopping the super-successful Swedish juggernaut?

Little did I know that the end was nigh. Suddenly disco was dead, New Wave married a pop sensibility to punk, and ABBA had inexplicably vanished, save for the odd K-tel compilation. I must admit that a few years later the songwriting half of ABBA, Benny Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus, rose in my estimation due to their collaboration with Tim Rice on the musical Chess. Highlights like I Know Him So Well and Pity the Child represented some of the best pop music to come out of the 80's, and it made me ponder the admirable craftsmanship behind the overplayed ABBA hits of the 70's. Yet it wasn't enough to inspire me to seek out and listen to the stuff. Even the renewed appreciation of ABBA that accompanied the Broadway success of Mama Mia! could not move my indifference.

In recent years, though, perhaps out of sheer nostalgia for a simpler time, my heart has softened toward the Swedish quartet, and I sometimes discover the familiar soft disco of Dancing Queen involuntarily echoing within my cranium. It comes and goes like a sudden craving for a bygone confection. Last Saturday, on a cloudless morning ideal for a solo road trip, I decided to give in to my brain's preoccupation by traveling to the tunes of ABBA Gold: Greatest Hits. The 1992 release includes 19 tracks, and I was surprised to find that a number of them were completely unfamiliar to me, even in name. Gee, it sure seemed like I knew a score of ABBA tunes, but I guess it must have been the same dozen played over and over again. Apparently the success of the compilation spawned a 1993 follow-up called More ABBA Gold: More ABBA Hits. I think a subtitle like Stuff You've Never Heard would be more appropriate. But I digress.

A piano glissando filled the cabin of my Civic as I sped down the highway. It segued into a gentle bass groove overlaid with ethereal background vocals and ham-fisted piano chords, and at last my brain found respite from its Dancing Queen earworm (the aural equivalent of hair o' the dog, sometimes actually listening to the song that loops through your head is the only antidote). I had thought I was thoroughly familiar with the recording, but it was a revelation to hear just how prominently the vocals were mixed. Surely Agnetha Faltskog and Anni-Frid Lyngstad were double-tracked, perhaps even triple-tracked or quadruple-tracked. That peculiarly nasal, all-out vocal assault was the signature sound of ABBA, and it dominated nearly every track on ABBA Gold.

Oh, it was fun at first. I smiled through Knowing Me, Knowing You and Take a Chance on Me, much as I might allow myself to go overboard with a second or third slice of chocolate cake. But by the time I had listened to all of Mama Mia, Lay All Your Love On Me, and Super Trouper, I was starting to feel a little sick. It dawned on me that ABBA is dessert music, not meant to be consumed as a main course, and anyone who wolfs down over an hour of Benny, Bjorn, Agnetha and Anni-Frid is asking for it. I plowed forward, though, even smiling at the overblown theatricality of Money, Money, Money, a gem I hadn't heard in over thirty years. Eventually I succumbed to a fit of aural nausea, barely holding on as I waited to hear the final track, Waterloo. When it finally arrived, its digital data was so near the perimeter of the compact disc that my CD player couldn't smoothly decode it. Despite my valiant effort to finish the business, I ended my journey listening to the same fifteen seconds of ABBA in a torturous loop. Fitting, really.

And so I now feel qualified to render a final verdict on the lasting effects of Sweden's most popular musical export on our culture. There is nothing wrong with ABBA, provided that one takes it in small doses. This is why the ubiquity of their hits eventually became insufferable toward the end of the disco era. May our nation never make that mistake again. No, you may listen to a little ABBA now and then, but only as a small part of a balanced musical diet. For example, you might allow yourself a hearing of Chiquitita after a contemplative rumination over Barber's Adagio for Strings. Or an evening of Tuvan throat singing might steel oneself for the one-two punch of Fernando followed by Voulez-Vous. Much more than this and you are risking overexposure.

Remember, there is a reason why the hedonistic excesses of the late 70's were eventually curtailed by the reins of reason. A body can only take so much. Listen responsibly.

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Why learn to balance on two wheels when you don't have to?

I don't remember exactly when I learned to ride a bicycle, but I'm pretty sure I was the last of my peers to acquire the skill. I have a vague notion that it wasn't even necessarily my idea. Somehow we ended up borrowing an old and rusted girls' bike with training wheels, a literal vehicle for shame and embarrassment. I knew that the whole world was watching me as I wobbled up and down the sidewalk. Ha, ha! Look at that kid who hasn't learned how to ride a bike yet! I kept my head down, tried to keep my balance, and wondered how I had unwittingly fallen behind the rest of the pack. Like every childhood drama, it seemed terribly important at the time.

My first experience with self-propelled vehicles was the classic tricycle, which by all accounts I heartily enjoyed. It was the standard, all-metal model with a runner between the back wheels. I am told that it was stolen from our front yard one night, a heartless thievery that I do not recall, yet I am willing to cast blame upon the anonymous robber for activating latent neuroses. If ever I am called to plead my case before a jury, I'm blaming whatever I did on the tricycle thief.

I never had another metal tricycle, but sometime shortly afterward I became the proud owner of a Big Wheel, the definitive tricyclic transportation of my generation. With its ultra-low seat and right-wheel handbrake for spinning out, I had great confidence in the coolness of my ride. It made a wonderful noise as its hollow, plastic wheels sped across concrete, a sound so distinctive that my grandfather once claimed he always knew that Dad and I were coming around the block for a visit when he heard the distant rumbling of my Big Wheel. I was perfectly happy with it, but there did come a day when I was physically too big for it. Marx Toys, maker of the Big Wheel, was ready to meet my needs, ready with a product that was to the Big Wheel what the Big Wheel was to old-school tricycles.

The Green Machine was a beautifully engineered contraption of elegant design. A recumbent tricycle with a bucket seat, it featured a broad axle in the back and a simulated mag wheel up front. It looked really sleek. But the coolest thing about a Green Machine was its absence of a steering wheel. In its place was a pair of side-mounted, stick-shift controls, which rotated the rear axle. Pull the left control back while pushing the right control forward, and you would turn left. Shift in the other direction to turn right. Although the pedals were fixed to the front wheel just like a Big Wheel, the rear-steering mechanism of the Green Machine meant that its front wheel was always straight as the plastic chassis. Consequently, one never had to deal with the annoying variation in pedal distance that accompanied every Big Wheel turn.

Oh, how I loved my Green Machine. Taking it out for a spin was the purest of joys. Sitting so close to the ground while getting the most out of its efficient drive design gave a thrilling illusion of speed. Its left-right shifters allowed an economy of motion that could not be afforded by a steering wheel. Truly, the Green Machine returned maximum locomotion for a minimal investment of effort. For someone like myself, a natural adherent to paths of least resistance, it was a blissful marriage. I was comfortable. I was cool. I was one with my Green Machine.

Since the distant days of the ancient book of Ecclesiastes, mankind has noted the transitory nature of all things, whether painful or pleasurable. "To everything there is a season," wrote its author and much later sang The Byrds, and all the turn-turn-turning of that front wheel, albeit never to the left nor right, eventually took its toll. There is only so much stress that plastic can endure. My last ride on a Green Machine came to a rolling halt immediately after I felt a strange lack of resistance in the pedals. Suddenly my legs were pumping like crazy, yet I was decelerating. The shaft of the pedal assembly had broken loose from the wheel's worn core. It was a devastating impotence.

Dad knew how much I loved the Green Machine and did everything he could to restore its operability, but the strongest compounds he applied could not withstand the force of pedaling. At that point, I don't even know that you could buy a Green Machine anymore, just as Big Wheels were disappearing from toy department shelves. Nor were replacement parts available. Alas, not with a bang but a whimper, my Green Machine was totaled. As with my stolen tricycle and outgrown Big Wheel, it was time to move on, whether I wanted to or not.

Surely I knew how to ride a bike by the time my Green Machine died? I would like to think so, yet the chronology is hopelessly jumbled in my mind. It is quite possible that I failed to learn this basic skill simply because I didn't have to. Really, with the comfort of a cool, recumbent tricycle at one's disposal, who needs to bother learning how to balance on two wheels? Having no other choice, I had to conquer my ineptitude. And believe me, riding a rusty girls' bike with training wheels is a strong motivator, so strong that I barely recall the learning process. One day I couldn't ride a bike, and then one day I could. Or at least that's all I remember. Perhaps I've repressed the struggle.

But I do remember my Green Machine. I know the exhilaration of neighbor's lawns whizzing by and the roar of the wind in my ears. I can still feel the rear axle responding to my grip on the stick-shift controls. I can summon vestiges of the pure joy I experienced speeding along as the sun set on many a summer evening. And the child inside me, for better or worse never far away, still hopes that one day he'll ride again.

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