Common wisdom — and perhaps even science — states that we humans only use a small portion of our Big Brains. The percentage bandied about ranges from 3-10 percent, but whatever figure you choose, it will be larger by far than the one describing the portion of the Internet you or I will use in a lifetime. Granted, there are propeller-heads who can, without leaving their chairs, use the 'Net to find out anything at all about anything at all. I, myself, have managed to do fruitful research on a number of topics. But when the shades have been drawn, and the deadliest of deadlines have been met, I use the Internet for its One True Purpose: surfing the WorldWide Web. If the truth be known, these forays into cyberspace have enabled me to learn a great deal about a great many things. But this educational aspect hasn't had an iota of impact on the amount of fun I've had.

At first my approach was completely random: I would treat the entire Web as a hypertext document and click on whatever looked interesting. More recently I've taken to setting some guidelines for myself, along with a one-hour time limit for any given session. Sometimes the "goal" isn't established until I'm on line: I'll hit Netscape's "What's New" button and take off from there. But sometimes the circumstances of my life will dictate the direction I point the Web browser. Indeed, my hours on the Internet have helped me decide on a piano, a guitar, a vacation, my next car, and what I'm going to watch on TV that night. I'll be reporting on some of these voyages under the heading An Hour On The Internet, and here's the first one.

Last March, during the course of my annual pilgrimage to Daytona Beach for Bike Week, I spent a few days in Key West. Despite great temptation, I didn't spend the entire time bar-hopping. Instead, one afternoon I put a few blocks between myself and Margaritaville, and indulged in a guided tour of Ernest Hemingway's house. I took away with me a renewed interest in Hemingway, and a paperbound copy of the complete Short Stories. Once home, I decided to re-read some of the novels, but a glance at the shelves revealed the great man's works to be conspicuously absent. The novel section jumped from Mark Helprin's "A Winter's Tale" to Oscar Hijuelos' "The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love" without a pause for "For Whom The Bell Tolls" or anything like it. Shocking! A trip to a nearby used book store quickly remedied the situation in the form of a stack of cheap paperbacks.

I read them with great relish, but after doing so I was left with a stack of cheap paperbacks. While no longer the book collector I used to be, I still enjoy the look and feel of a fine hardbound edition. Given the likelihood that I'll return to Hemingway several times over the course of my remaining years, I decided to investigate the notion of replacing those cheap paperbacks with something more permanent and aesthetically pleasing. Now, I could have simply filled one of the Electra-Glide's saddlebags with money and driven from one antiquarian bookseller to another, but that wouldn't have resulted in a column about using the Internet. So instead I fired up Netscape Navigator and pointed it at Yahoo. (Yahoo, in case you just returned from Saturn, is the jumping off point of choice for any WWW search. Its URL is http://www.yahoo.com.)

In common with many of my contemporaries, I used to smoke cigarettes. I started smoking as a teenager in Brooklyn because... well, because that's what a teenager in Brooklyn did in the mid-sixties. I stopped a couple of times, once for more than a decade, and smoked my last cigarette in late 1991. Every one of the untold thousands I smoked was a true pleasure, but I can truthfully say that I don't miss them in the slightest. But while I don't miss cigarettes, I often wax nostalgic over certain aspects of smoking. I loved, for example, the lighting ritual. Satisfying on a purely personal level, it could also be used to inject a calming pause into a discussion that was getting too heated. This was particularly true at work, where my desk drawer held an old red brick and a box of "strike anywhere" kitchen matches. Smoking also provided a focus at flea markets, where I was always on the lookout for an interesting vintage lighter. But this is, after all, the Age of Enlightenment, and even at my most curmudgeonly I don't regret having given up cigarettes. It's been brought to my attention, though, that there's a big difference between giving up cigarettes and giving up smoking altogether. You see, I was recently offered a Very Good Cigar. I didn't accept the offer at the time, but it set me to thinking. I know more than one cigar smoker who is enthusiastic on the subject to the point of fanaticism. These are men whose opinions I respect, and if they derive unreasonable pleasure from spending an hour with a cigar, who am I to demur? Nobody, that's who.

It was time to gather information: the only thing I knew for sure about cigars was that I needed to know more.

Less than twelve hours from now I'm going to voluntarily strap myself into a chair inside a long metal cylinder, which will itself be propelled through the skies at an alarming speed. During my hours within this tube I will sit in a chair whose design would please Torquemada, be offered food that might justifiably cause a prison riot, and breathe air whose quality would give OSHA cause for alarm in any workplace in the land. Then the tube (which carries the insultingly reassuring name "aircraft") will plummet seven or eight miles towards the earth's surface and, if all goes according to plan, alight with its contents — me, when you get right down to it — intact. They call this ordeal air travel, and a week later, I'll do the whole thing again in the other direction. I will endure these two carnival rides from hell in order to spend the intervening week on a Mexican beach, with plenty of Cuban cigars and cerveza (my only Spanish word) to calm my frazzled nerves.

Mind you, my before-the-fact description of these two flights is not based on mere speculation: I've taken several hundred flights over the years, and the best that I can say about even the least awful of them was that it was unmemorable. But air travel doesn't have to be that way, and for a brief and shining moment it wasn't. During the few years that the great airships plied the skies, passengers could cross an ocean — or a continent — in a couple of days, enjoying amenities similar to those offered by the finest transatlantic steamers. They would arrive at their destinations rested, bathed, and well-fed, ready for work, play, or empire building. The age of the airship came to a sudden halt in Lakehurst, New Jersey, at 7:25 pm on May 6, 1937, when the hydrogen-filled Hindenburg exploded and burst into flame during its docking maneuvers. Prior to the accident, the Hindenburg and its sister ship the Graf Zeppelin had logged over 1,000,000 miles without loss of life. Plans for a great transatlantic fleet had been set in motion, and the Goodyear-Zeppelin Company was established to manufacture airships.

Had the Hindenburg been filled with helium rather than the highly volatile hydrogen, the skies might be filled with Zeppelins to this day. Granted, there would still be a place in this scenario for jet airliners: they would be highly useful for hurtling harried executives, who haven't any time to waste, to their Big Meetings. But those of us who believe that — at least to some degree — the ride is the destination, would be well served by airships of the Zeppelin class. Now, over the years pictures of lighter-than-air craft have appeared on the covers of the various popular science magazines, accompanied by tantalizing blurbs like "does the XYZ herald an airship renaissance?" Unfortunately, the answer always turned out to be "no."

I wondered if this situation was likely to change. Would I ever be offered the chance to travel by air in a style to which I'd dearly love to become accustomed? My Magic 8-Ball being out of commission at the moment, I decided to use the next best resource to find out. It was time for An Hour On The Internet.

Sunglasses (January 17, 1996)

The advice of ZZ Top is usually faultless: who, for instance, would contradict their assertion that "every girl's crazy 'bout a sharp dressed man."? But when it comes to Cheap Sunglasses — a subject about which they feel strongly enough to make a song title — I've had to draw the line and go my own way. The average pair of drugstore wonders gives me a headache, and has lenses that are invariably either too dark or too light to be of any real use. They also get scratched pretty easily, or would if I wasn't likely to lose or squash them so quickly: a $10-15 investment doesn't inspire constant vigilance. Over the years I've found that cheap sunglasses have a life span of, at best, about five or six weeks, which, of course, makes them enormously expensive in the long run. Since I wear sunglasses all year 'round, we could be talking about ten pair a year. At that rate, I'd have to spend well over a grand for a ten year's supply of something I didn't want in the first place!

Contrast that with the single pair of Revo Grand Ventures that served me so well for a decade. Having spent a hefty $125 for them in 1985, I took great pains to keep them from being lost or damaged. For ten years, every time I put them on the world appeared to be a better place. Then, on the last motorcycle trip of last season, a bee flew between my left eye and the lens. Choosing, after a moment's reflection, to sacrifice the glasses in the interest of retaining control of the bike, I slapped the Revos to the ground, where they were promptly turned into tiny bits of ground glass. One of my riding buddies offered up a spare pair of scratchy old cheap sunglasses for the rest of the ride home. They provided a view that was as dismal as my mood, and I was delighted to return them at the end of the ride. For the next few months a backup pair of Ray-Bans kept my retinas from frying, but I knew that before the Spring thaw I'd need a replacement for the Revos. But what to choose? After all, ten years had gone by, and sunglass technology might have made some startling leaps. I needed information. It was time to spend An Hour On The Internet.

The Volkswagen Beetle (January 25, 1996)

Like many of my aging baby-boomer contemporaries, I spent a goodly number of my first miles as Licensed Motor Vehicle Operator in a Volkswagen Beetle. This humble vehicle, whose design and specifications were more-or-less etched in stone well before World War II, established a foothold in this country in the fifties, by which time its technology was already well on the road to obsolescence. This didn't stop it from becoming a huge success in the 'sixties, and it eventually surpassed the Ford Model T as the largest selling single model in the world. Then, while we were looking the other way, the Beetle suddenly — or at least it seemed sudden — disappeared. Where once every third car used to be a Beetle, sighting one now is much like flipping through the channels and somehow finding the Glenn Miller Orchestra playing on MTV. At least that's the case where I normally hang out, but my recent trip to Mexico provided a different perspective. (I might mention, by the way, that all of the air travel-related trepidations mentioned in this space a couple of issues back were proven during this journey to be well-founded.)

It turns out that while Volkswagen stopped offering the Beetle in this country after the 1979 model year, the company's Mexican factory still churns them out for local consumption. And consume them they do, in great numbers. Step incautiously off the curb and the odds were roughly one in three that the car knocking you down would be a Beetle. The sound of all of those air-cooled "pancake" fours brought back a flood of memories — some might call them flashbacks — and all of a sudden I was feeling wistful about Beetles. Now, as it happens I'm kind of in the market for a car: the family is down to a single four-wheeled vehicle. The sight of all of those Mexican Beetles, and a vivid memory of the old ad that proclaimed it as the way the snow plow driver got to work, led me to the conclusion that an old Beetle might not be a bad purchase. Fortunately, painful experience has taught me (albeit not nearly soon enough) to be wary of such impulses and I decided to do a little research before beginning my quest for rear-engined bliss. It was time to spend An Hour On The Internet!

Bike Week Preparations (February 28, 1996)

Along with half-a-million of my fellow motorcycle enthusiasts, I spend much of the month of February obsessing about, and preparing for, Bike Week. This event, which takes place in and around Daytona Beach in early March, is especially important to those of us whose bikes are (figuratively speaking) buried by mountains of snow each winter. By February some of us have been known to revert to a childlike state, making "vroom-vroom" sounds while holding imaginary handlebars. It's no wonder that we spend much of the month before departure making lists, checking supplies, studying maps, and combing catalogues for last-minute "must have" doodads.

Now, I know a few stalwart souls who, even though they live in The Great White North, bundle up and head south on two wheels. I genuflect in their presence, and speak of their accomplishments in a hushed tone, for theirs is a noble feat. I then make a mental note to grease the bearings on my trailer. Despite having a sense of adventure that some say is unbecoming in someone pushing — even from a distance — the half-century mark, I'm not anxious to subject myself to that ordeal. Instead, for the fifth year in a row a friend and I will lash our bikes to the trailer and spend the next 22 hours in a van, drinking coffee, eating junk food, and arguing over what tape to play next. At the end of the journey, upstate New York's icy winds and frost-heaved roads will be a dim memory. Then, after a serious dose of fun-in-the-sun (that will include a few days in Key West, away from all of those damned bikers!), we'll run the scene backwards and drive the 1200 miles home. The hope, naturally, is that by the time we reach home Spring will have taken hold and riding season will have begun.

This year, however, a stray monkey wrench worked its way into the plans. I was informed by my partner-in-trailering that a scheduling conflict required him to leave Florida several days early. I had two choices: one was to cut the trip short; the other, to find another means of getting myself and 800 pounds of motorcycle back home. Well, the first option being totally out of the question, I was left to ponder transportation alternatives and it didn't take too long to realize that only one was available. There was nothing to do but ride the sucker home, and surprisingly enough, the prospect didn't fill my heart with terror. I realized that while weather-related delays heading towards Bike Week could cause me to miss it entirely, a northbound trip could be made at a relatively leisurely pace. I would have to find a means to deal with the cold, but having done that my only real concern would be with the road surface: two wheels and ice or snow aren't a fun combination! But without the pressure of a fixed schedule, if necessary I could hole up in a roadside motel and watch TV until the roads were clear. This was beginning to sound like the makings of an adventure, and since an adventurer needs to be prepared it was time to spend An Hour On The Internet.

Argentine Tango (March 13, 1996)

Not so very long ago, maybe a year and a half, a friend and I were talking seriously about going into business together. This was a very exciting notion: our individual skills seemed complementary, we got along very well personally, and she had already demonstrated a penchant for financial success. In short, visions of sugar plums danced in my head. Then, for reasons that are still unclear, she decided to spend a couple of days at a Tango workshop, during which time she underwent a metamorphosis of Kafkaesque proportion. In short, she went buggy for the Tango. That introductory workshop was quickly followed by some intensive lessons and a trip to Argentina, where the transformation was completed. She returned to the States, put on her dancing shoes, and made plans to devote her life to the Tango and its culture. In what seemed like no time at all, she placed her upstate New York home on the market, moved to California, and enrolled in an advanced degree program in dance education at Stanford University. She has begun to teach students of her own and will, I am certain, soon be a Big Wheel in national and even international tango circles. I, on the other hand, will remain a very minor cog in the immense publishing empire that pays (far too little) for these words.

Frankly, I don't get it. I've listened to tango music. Granted, the beat is catchy, and some of the tunes are interesting, but in the main they call to mind a bumper sticker I once saw that stated "Use An Accordion, Go To Jail: It's The Law." I've even, after a fashion, danced to the Tango on more than one New Year's Eve. One time it inspired me to order another bottle of Champagne, but that was it. I felt no desire to buy tight pants, hire a moving van, and change my life. Clearly, my DNA lacks the requisite tango gene. But while I might not be able to empathize with my erstwhile partner-to-be, I could at least try to learn more about what she's doing. Our conversations on the subject had left me with the impression that there existed a vast tango subculture; a late-night "underground" inhabited by folks who, to all appearances, are as normal as you or I. Indeed, at one New York tango event she spent much of the evening dancing with a Very Famous Actor. (O.K., it was Robert Duvall, but you didn't hear it from me.) There was, I decided, more to the Tango than met the eye, and I decided to devote An Hour On The Internet to the subject.

Electric Guitars (March 26, 1996)

Like most of my friends, I spent the six months prior to my 13th birthday preoccupied with two things: preparing for my Bar Mitzvah, and daydreaming about what I would buy with all of the loot that I hoped would come my way during that event. (As it turned out, I should have spent a little more time preparing, but that's another story.) Most of those daydreams revolved around electric guitars, in retrospect an odd choice in the pre-Beatles era. Still, I was a big Ventures fan, and on a good day could struggle through "Walk, Don't Run" on my battered second-hand Harmony Master. Although I had never actually played an electric guitar, the ones on the album covers looked very cool and — the best part — could get loud.

Being a typical kid, I focused on the obvious. If one pickup was good, two were better, and three — well, three clearly indicated a "professional" instrument. Looking through the mail order catalogues I had accumulated, I allowed myself to be dazzled by knobs, vibrato bars, and shiny paint jobs. Finally, after much agonizing, I decided on a flashy three-pickup "house brand" solid-body. Its $200 price tag would leave me with $100 for an amplifier, for after long negotiations my parents had agreed that, while the bulk of the proceeds would be banked, $300 could be devoted to furthering my musical "career."

Finally, the Big Day came and went: the prayers had been prayed, the dances had been danced, and the cake had been eaten. It was time to get my guitar. Fortunately, while they knew nothing about guitars, my parents knew more than a little about shopping. Instead of sending a check to East Nowhere, they took me to a local music store where I quickly discovered the difference between no-name models and those that bore the logos of genuine guitar companies. I showed the salesman my catalogue, and he brought out a guitar that looked just like the one in the picture, and cost $50. It was, you'll pardon my expression, a piece of crap. At this point my dad interceded and, without disclosing our budget, told the salesman to bring out something that wouldn't fall apart in six weeks. He nodded, walked over to The Wall, and brought down a cherry red Gibson SG Special.

What a difference! The SG played like a dream, looked positively fantastic, and bore a price tag that left room in the budget for a plush-lined hard case and an Ampeg Reverb-o-Rocket amplifier. Rock & roll heaven! I got together with some friends, started a band, and after playing for a while at The Cavern Club in Munich, we moved back to England and changed the face of popular culture. No, wait, that was another band entirely.

I played that red SG for a few years and then, some 20 years before MTV made it fashionable, "unplugged" and traded it for the first in a long succession of acoustic guitars. But I've been thinking about that red Gibson SG lately. Maybe it's because that "other" band is back in the news; maybe I'm having a mid-life crisis, and know that a Porsche and a mistress are simply out of the question. But whatever the reason, I've decided that there's room in my life for an electric guitar. But what kind? Most of the brands in the stores today didn't even exist when I went shopping for my SG. There was a lot to learn. It was time to spend An Hour On The Internet.

Luggage (April 25, 1996)

Although from today's vantage point it hardly seems possible, for many years I had a Real Job, complete with alarm clocks, neckties, and commuter trains. During that period, which lasted for maybe a decade, I was obliged to make fairly regular business trips by air. A few — ok, more than a few — of these trips were "press junkets" involving a quick factory tour and then several days of sightseeing in exotic lands. Twice a year I'd attend a week-long trade show, and since the January show was in Las Vegas I'd generally leave a week early and burn some vacation time in California first.

For trips like these I would cram pretty near everything I owned into two or three huge suitcases, check them at the terminal entrance, and hope for the best. But these extended journeys were comparatively unusual. In most instances the trip was a quick overnighter, during which the president of Blastophonic Sound Systems would raise the curtain on his company's Next Big Thing, and then treat the awe-struck audience to a steak dinner. (And don't get on my case for about sexist pronouns. Every one of these events, and there were dozens upon dozens of them, was presided over by a man — usually a fat man — in a suit. But I digress.)

For these trips, I would pack only what would fit in a soft sided multi-compartment attache case that served double duty as an astonishingly capacious piece of carry-on luggage. It would accommodate a rudimentary change of clothes, a modest toilet kit, and a couple of magazines for the flight, and still have room for the inevitable three or four pounds of brochures and press releases that I would carry home from the event. (In most instances, I wouldn't actually have to read the stuff, but it was useful as proof that my absence from the office was truly related to business.)

You'll note the absence of a notebook computer from my packing list, which omission would be unthinkable today. Most of these trips were made before such things became common. In fact, they were made before the phrase "frequent flyer" meant anything more than "you poor slob: get ready for yet another preview of hell." Instead of a computer, I carried two pens and a small notepad, just in case those items weren't in ample supply at the big event.

It's been some time since my last business flight, but not too long ago I was prevailed upon to make a trip that called for both an overnight stay and a notebook computer. Since the weather report called for fair skies, I decided to make the trip of some 200 miles on my motorcycle. Thus resolved, I retrieved my trusty carry-on from the back of the closet, and began to gather the various garments, medicines, and cosmetic items that the trip would require. As the pile of "I can't be without this" items grew taller, I began to realize that my miracle bag's capacity hadn't kept pace. It wouldn't even begin to accommodate my personal effects, much less those items and the computer. The obvious solution was to throw everything into a great big suitcase and make the trip by car, but given the impetus of a winter that seemed to have lasted for six years, I was loathe to abandon the notion of two-wheeled travel. In the end I managed to jury-rig a temporary container out of corrugated cardboard, foam rubber, plastic wrap, and bungee cords. Somehow it all held together, but it was clear that I would have to begin a quest for luggage. It was time to spend An Hour On The Internet.

Finding A Car (May 16, 1996)

A few — or maybe more than a few — years ago, a Prominent Automotive Journalist described me to his even more prominent boss as having "a debilitating passion for cars." This passion dictated my choice of transportation for a good quarter-century: at least half of the 34 cars I've owned since 1968 were bought on a "gotta have it" basis. Take my first 1966 Imperial, the funereal black LeBaron that I chased down a Brooklyn street in 1976, and bought on the spot. Vivid memories of the then-recent Arab oil embargo and its attendant gas rationing notwithstanding, I celebrated our bicentennial behind the wheel of a 5000-pound leviathan whose 440 cubic-inch V8 burned gas as though a gallon cost 35¢ — which it did in 1966. This was an American car in the grand tradition.

Then there was the '72 Mercedes 280SEL 4.5, whose sight-unseen purchase in Los Angeles was guided in great part by the "cars don't rust in California" theory. After a grueling cross-country drive back to New York — the southern route, in mid-July, with no A/C — I discovered that my pride and joy had spent the first ten years of its life in New Jersey. The 4.5's foundation of rust, cleverly concealed by some artful West Coast bodywork, began to surface before Labor Day, as did a seemingly endless succession of hideously expensive mechanical woes. The "my-first-Mercedes" excitement was quickly overshadowed by "my-first-Mercedes-mechanic" anguish. Still, when it was running right I flat-out loved that car, and the experience didn't keep me from buying four more of its ilk. I loved them all, just as I loved the '51 and '52 Cadillacs, the '64 Jaguar, the '63 Riviera, the several '65 Mustangs, and the second '66 Imperial. To this day, I regret selling each and every one of them.

Of course, allowing emotion, rather than reason, to serve as the basis for choosing a car has cost me an enormous sum of money. (Shoddy record-keeping prevents me from determining exactly how enormous, thank goodness. Knowing the figure would certainly lead to serious depression, or worse.) I don't consider this money to have been wasted, for along with pleasure it bought transportation. After all, many of my contemporaries spent similar or greater sums on far more ephemeral pastimes, and they have nothing to show for it but inflamed sinus cavities. But I digress.

Five years ago I moved from suburban Westchester to a more bucolic upstate New York setting and the change in air seems to have dramatically suppressed my automotive yearnings. The current family car is a big, comfortable, anonymous 1990 American sedan. A Mercury Grand Marquis, of all things. It is so boring that staring at it for five minutes causes me to doze off. But with close to 100,000 miles on the clock, and having had virtually no maintenance beyond regular oil changes, it's still as reliable as an anvil. A wonderful vehicle in its own way, and when it's gone I'll forget it in a New York heartbeat.

Several factors have affected my vehicular metamorphosis. Certainly, finances play a role: an "interesting" car that can be used on a daily basis is no longer a casual purchase. Our hideous upstate winters must be considered as well. For much of the year the roads are covered by a corrosive mixture of salt, gravel, and slush. Believe me, it's not the sort of goop you'd want clinging to the delicate undercarriage of a loved one. And, of course, there's the Harley, which provides me with an alternate source of over-the-road jollies. Weather permitting — a phrase which covers a lot of ground — I prefer to travel behind my Electra-Glide's bat-wing fairing. An hour or two in the saddle, listening to the V-Twin's basso profundo exhaust note echo off the pavement, takes much of the edge off any incipient yearning for a goofball car.

I bring all of this to the table because it will soon be time to find another car. Winters in the salt belt cannot but take their toll, and the Mercury's once-pristine flanks are beginning to show their age. It has embarked on the inevitable journey down the road to beaterhood. (Dry those tears at once. In these parts, the beater is a noble, well-respected breed. I expect that the Mercury will soldier on for another 50,000 miles, albeit in a less Grand fashion.) As I ponder its fate, I also consider the bewildering array of choices that lie ahead, and they make my head swim. New or used? Bought or leased? Dealership or private party sale? And let's not forget the vehicle itself. Should I get "another one just like the other one" or does the voice inside my head resound with a Pythonesque "and now for something completely different?" I needed answers; I needed to spend An Hour On The Internet.

Back to College (June 10, 1996)

A furtive glance at the calendar reveals that we are now slogging our way through 1996. This may not mean much to you, but a little quick arithmetic places it into a context that I find both frightening and appalling: a full three decades have passed since I packed my satchel and went away to college. To tell you the truth, I remember very little of what occurred during the classroom portion of that exercise. The Hendrixian purple haze that was so much a part of that era has been further burnished by the passage of time. While there's no question that I was taught many important facts by many learned scholars, I can't recite many of the former, nor can I identify any of the latter. Indeed, the time I spent under the tutelage of Mrs. Janis, Mrs. Shaffer, and Mrs. Greenberg — the long-suffering saints who shepherded me through Grades 1 through 6 — were almost certainly more significant from an educational standpoint.

This is not to imply that I didn't find The College Experience highly valuable, and that I don't recommend it as an alternative to, well, to whatever the alternatives are. In fact, my son goes to college, and I wouldn't have it any other way. At this very moment I am sure that he is pondering whatever males of his generation ponder while preparing for another year of Higher Education. He might be reflecting, in a "you guys had all of the fun" sort of way, on the injustice that's been heaped on the youth of today. After all, much of what defined the college experience in the sixties has today become unfashionable, distasteful, or potentially lethal. But if one of our generation's rallying cries was "sex, drugs, and rock & roll," another was "keep those grades up or you'll wind up in Viet Nam so fast it'll make your head spin." Those words were spoken, with what I thought was inappropriate enthusiasm, by the officiating officer at the end of my draft board physical examination. On balance, college life isn't all that awful in the latter half of the nineties. But "not awful" isn't necessarily wonderful, so I decided to do a little research with a view towards enhancing, albeit in a modest way, the lad's forthcoming semester. Needless to say, it was time to spend an Hour on the Internet.

By Motorcycle to Atlanta (June 26, 1996)

I am a man of many passions: Only a couple of issues back I admitted to what was once dispassionately described as "a debilitating passion for cars," and in earlier iterations this column has dealt with topics ranging from rare books and airships to sunglasses and cigars. But these subjects pale when compared with the first few items on my list of favorite pastimes. Come first thaw I don't need much of an excuse to hop on the old Harley and burn a tank or six of Sunoco's finest. And regardless of the weather, my soul can be stirred by a good menu — especially if it's accompanied by a beer and wine list. Indeed, the unofficial slogan of the Harley Owners Group chapter I ride with is "Live to Ride, Ride to Eat."

And then there's the Grateful Dead, whose own soul was so tragically (albeit not surprisingly) wrenched from us last August. Although not a "tour head" in the purest sense of the word, I managed to attend a good hundred shows before Garcia's death pulled the plug. The demise of the Dead left a serious void in both my psyche and my summer plans. The plan was to spend five or six weeks on the Electra-Glide, visiting friends and attending as many East Coast Summer Tour shows as possible. Obviously, this was not to be. Then, through a remarkable confluence of events, an opportunity to indulge all of these passions arose. As winter inched its way towards spring, the Grateful Dead's summer tour was replaced by the Furthur Festival, an extravaganza featuring five bands related in one way or another to the Dead. As it became clear that winter was going to last an extra long time this year, my wife decided to visit friends in Atlanta, and picked the weekend after the date of the first Further Festival show to do so. As soon as I realized this, I piped up "I'll tell you what: you fly to Atlanta on Friday after work, and I'll ride the bike down a few days earlier and catch the show on Thursday." She ordered her 'plane tickets; I called my own long-time Deadhead friends in Atlanta and stated that I was finally going to make good on my threat to come down for a visit. As a bonus, one of them had an inside track on superb seats so, to quote the late Mr. Garcia there was "nothing left to do but smile, smile, smile."

As someone who is self-employed (check the masthead — contributing editors are most emphatically not on the receiving end of any corporate benefit packages) I'm in the fortunate position of having a very understanding boss. When opportunities such as this arise, I can usually take advantage of them, and in this instance it was clear the decks and take no prisoners: I was about to be gone. But first a route had to be planned, restaurants researched... there was much to do. It was time to spend An Hour On The Internet.

As I searched the house for my new (and very first pair of) reading glasses, it occured to me that life has become a series of reminders of my ever-advancing age and decrepitude. It seems like only yesterday that, taken to task for studiously avoiding any and all strenuous effort, I blithely replied that "pushing 40 is exercise enough." Now, hardly a day goes by without a new and surprising ache or pain. Most mornings there seems to be more hair in the shower drain than on my head. My closet is jam-packed with clothes that no longer fit. Now, when the subject of exertion comes up, I'm less likely to wise off with a "pushing 50" remark.

I bring up the number '50' because it's associated with another event: come November, my parents will be celebrating their Golden wedding anniversary! By today's standards, they were a couple of kids back in 1946: dad had only recently turned 21, and mom wasn't yet out of her teens. But saving the world (in what Studs Terkel rightly termed "The Good War") caused the youth of that generation to grow up fast. In 1946, the couple who would eventually become my parents were ready to take on life, and each other. Who's to say they were wrong? Certainly not the close and less-than-close friends who are my contemporaries. I can count the ones who haven't been through at least one divorce without resorting to two hands.

Of course, not everyone was thrilled with the notion of my parents' wedding. The initial reaction in some quarters inspired them to flee Brooklyn (not an altogether bad idea, even then) and elope to Miami Beach. Shortly thereafter, tempers having cooled, they returned to Brooklyn and repeated the ceremony for the benefit of the now-reconciled — and, indeed, enthusiastic — families.

Fifty years, married to the same person... imagine that! The over-used phrase "this calls for a celebration" floats before me, shimmering in bold letters. But how to celebrate? For their silver anniversary, my sister and I sent the parents off on a cruise. Aside from being a very nice way to spend a week, a cruise is a snap to plan. Basically, once you choose a departure date and a budget, and the trip plans itself. But twenty years after the fact, we learned that the hapless couple had spent most of the voyage (how to put this delicately?) leaning over the rail. This time, we'd have to do a little more homework. After a bit of brainstorming, we decided that the best way to celebrate a golden anniversary would be where it all started: Miami Beach. We further decided that while they might be the focus of this Big Event, our venerable ancestors shouldn't be the only ones to enjoy fun in the sun. Rather than send them to Miami Beach, we would take them to Miami Beach.

I should offer up a word or two on the destination, for when it was first brought up I was aghast. When Mom and Dad went to Miami Beach in 1946, it was pretty hot stuff, and it remained so at least through the early sixties. But by 1970 — the last time I was there — it had become — to put it as nicely as possible — a bit seedy. It turns out, though, that over the last few years Miami Beach in general, and the Art Deco South Beach area in particular, has undergone a startling transformation. As the young folks used to — and for all I know still — say, It's a "happening" scene, dude!

So Miami Beach it would be, and the logistics would be my responsibility. I would need to arrange round-trip transportation (car, train, airplane?), a week's lodging (resort, hotel, guest house?), local transportation, food, and diversions for three couples. It was time to spend An Hour On The Internet.

Wireless Communication (August 7, 1996)

Some of the topics dealt with on these pages might lead you to conclude that I don't spend a great deal of time at work. My obvious preoccupation with air travel, motorcycles, automobiles, and similar subjects might make it seem as though I'd rather be anywhere but at my desk. This is true, but it doesn't mean I don't work hard. I mean, sure, I don't plow fields, or dig ditches, or endlessly roll a huge boulder up a hill, but neither do I sit back and clip coupons (dammit). The occasional twinges that indicate the onset of carpal tunnel syndrome attest to the endless hours I spend at the keyboard, toiling for the edification of you, the seeker after knowledge. Fortunately, the wonders of our age make it possible for that keyboard to be just about anywhere I choose to be at any given moment. For all you know, I could have written this column while reclining in a sylvan glade, listening to a babbling brook, and wondering whether the laptop has sufficient juice to take me through the bottom of the page. (For that matter, I might be using a legal pad and a number two pencil. You bet!) The miracles of modern technology have made it possible for me to research, write, and transmit my copy to The Home Office from anywhere there's a phone line. In fact, I've done some writing in the aforementioned sylvan glade, and in any number of other likely and unlikely locales.

A situation has arisen, however, that will tax my ability to combine business with pleasure. I've been invited to spend a week, perhaps two, on a sailboat cruising down the New England coast. It's a good-sized boat, with power available for charging the laptop's battery, but that begs the question of Internet access. This would have to be a working vacation; while I might be able to haul the computer ashore when we're anchored for the night, I'd need more access time than that to continue with the various projects that are in various stages of incompletion right now. I would also have to deal with the subject of seasickness. Despite my love of sailing, sailing has little affection for me. To keep from embarrassing myself at sea, I am obliged to seek pharmacological aid in the form of a medicinal patch much like that used by aspiring non-smokers. But when I mentioned these miraculous devices to my potential host, he averred that they were no longer available. Yikes! Obviously, I needed information on several levels. It was time to spend An Hour On The Internet.

I just spent four days at the New Jersey State HOG (Harley Owners Group) Rally, which took place in the beach (or, as they say in Joisey, shore) resort town of Wildwood. The event was notable for several reasons, not the least of which was my own choice of ride: a candy-apple red Honda GL1500 Gold Wing Aspencade. Since HOG stands for Harley Owners Group, I took quite a bit of ribbing as I parked the Wing under a sign that read "Harley Parking Only: All Others Will Be Crushed." Of course, my ordeal was as nothing compared to the razzing received by those "bikers" who chose to heed The Weather Channel's warnings about Hurricane Fran. These hardy souls arrived at the event comfortably ensconced in their plush Jeep Grand Cherokees, Lincoln Town Cars, and Acura Legends. The cloudless skies and balmy temperatures that prevailed throughout the long weekend provided endless opportunities for comments like "Hey John, wanna go for a ride? Oh, right, you didn't bring your bike... hahahahaha!"

Actually, the Jersey Shore's geography doesn't inspire a great deal of recreational riding, and most of the event was spent either in or around the motel pool, or in restaurants. Now, you might expect a group of rough-and-tumble bikers to wile away the hours swapping stories involving — to put it politely — wine, women, and maybe a little bit of song. That might have been the case two or three decades ago, when (as the T-shirt says) sex was safe and motorcycles were dangerous. But the average age of the members of the HOG chapter I ride with is sufficiently advanced to inspire talk of a very different nature. In fact, most of the discussions sounded very much like those I overheard as a youth, when my grandfather and his cronies sat down for an evening of cigars and pinochle. Like those alte kockers, we discussed the various aches, pains, medications, and surgical procedures that plagued our transition from young adulthood, to middle-age, and beyond. I heard it stated, for instance, that a coronary bypass is best handled by an older, more experienced surgeon, but for an angioplasty you're better off with a younger doctor. Why? Because a doctor who played video games as a child will more adept at controlling the probe via remote control, while watching its progress on a TV monitor. Amazing!

Needless to say, I returned from the weekend with a heightened awareness of my own ailments, real and/or imagined. And, despite a having based my life on the mottoes "No Pain, No Pain" and "Eat Right, Stay Fit, Die Anyway" I vowed to do something about them. Since a journey of a thousand miles begins with a good stiff drink and some contemplation of the time-honored question "is this trip really necessary?" I decided to take a personal inventory. Starting at the top, I found that nothing hurt until I reached my neck, but that there were serious issues running down both arms and culminating in my wrists. What a surprise: I spend a good portion of my working day typing, and exhibit the symptoms of carpal tunnel syndrome.

Based on peripheral knowledge, I was aware that this ailment was one that a) wouldn't go away by itself, and 2) would get worse unless I made some changes in my daily routine. My first choice would be to inherit a vast sum of money, and never touch a keyboard again. Unfortunately, that's not going to happen, so I would have to seek an alternative form of therapy. It was time to spend An Hour On The Internet.

Thirty years ago I packed a satchel and left Brooklyn in order to attend college in upstate New York. After putting in my time there, I returned to the hustle and bustle of Big City, and then Big City Suburban life. But in the back of my mind I knew that, one day, I would move back upstate. It took a couple of decades, but it finally happened. In fact, it happened nearly six years ago, which is more than a little frightening, given that much of my stuff is still in boxes. Still, the point is that I'm here, and years of anticipation didn't take any of the luster off the reality of the situation. There's a great deal to like about living in, or at least within shouting distance of, the country, but as I list them in my head it becomes clear that many of them apply only during the more temperate months. Have I mentioned that we got ten feet of snow last year? My wife reminded me of that fact as she pointed to the stack of snow tires in the corner of the garage. I took the hint and installed them on the car; on the only car we own.

I'd been putting off the chore of seeking a second car for months, preferring to rely on the motorcycle for my own transportation. Between March and November, I had traveled nearly 14,000 miles on two wheels, but the act of loading the snow tires into the trunk of the Mercury jolted me into frigid reality. The lovely and talented Mrs. Drucker is gainfully employed, and drives to work. The end of riding season meant that I would either find a second car or find myself stranded. It was time to go shopping. But for what? The aforementioned ten feet of snow inspires thoughts of four wheel drive, which in these parts generally translates into "truck." But I don't want a truck. I hardly ever need to do anything a truck is good for, and when I do I can rent one. But unless you spend thirty or forty (or, if you're really nuts, fifty) grand on one of the new high-zoot models, trucks make truly lousy cars. They bounce, rattle, and lurch down the road without any concern for the comfort of their occupants. In a word, they ride like trucks. Since I had no intention of spending the kind of money being asked for a "gentlemen's truck-like vehicle" — a Range Rover, Land Cruiser, or even a Grand Cherokee Orvis Edition — the search would have to take a different direction. I would have to choose from among the far more limited class of all-wheel-drive (AWD) cars that have been offered, off-and-on, over the years.

Two car companies have stood at the forefront of AWD marketing over the last decade or two: Subaru and Audi. In addition, several other makers have tested the AWD waters, only to decide that the market was too small to be economically viable. Mercedes Benz offered the splendid E-class 4-Matic for a few years; Toyota grafted its All-Trac technology onto several existing models; Honda offered the Real-Time AWD Civic wagon; Chrysler imported a system from Austria for its mini-vans; Porsche tamed many of the 911's rear-bias handling ills with the Carrera 4 version; BMW took the Biff-and-Buffy compact sedan, added all wheel drive, and created the go-anywhere 325iX; even Ford and GM had a go, with their Escort and Pontiac 6000LE sedans.

I struck several names off the list out-of-hand. A Mercedes, even the oldest possible example, was way beyond my means; ditto the Porsche, even if I didn't care about a back seat. The Honda was too small, the Toyotas too old (as Toyotas go), the Ford and Pontiac were dull as dirt, and the Chrysler minivans were, well minivans. For purely quixotic reasons I decided that if I were to buy any Subaru, it would have to be a new Subaru, one of those neat Outback wagons that Crocodile Dundee is so excited about. I decided to find out more about that vehicle, and about the only others that remained on the original list, Audi's Quattro and the BMW 325iX. Having more confidence in the longevity of the Teutonic contenders, I had no reluctance to consider a used example. A good thing, too: even the least costly new Quattro was more than twice my budget, and the last new 325iX rolled off the line in 1991. So, the next step was to discover the pros and cons of a relatively few car models. It was time to spend An Hour On The Internet.

As I plan this season's Ride-to-the-Music, I'm reminded of the important differences between taking a road trip in a Mercedes Benz convertible, and traveling the same route astride a Harley-Davidson Electra Glide motorcycle. You'd think that one big difference is luggage space, but the Mercedes had a fairly small trunk while the Harley's saddle bags and "Tour-Pak" are surprisingly roomy. There's plenty of room for the must-haves, so traveling on two wheels is simply an exercise in not packing unnecessary stuff. Naturally, weather plays a bigger role in the overall scheme of things. When the heat and humidity made top-down travel nothing more than a fashion statement, up went the canvas top, and on went the very capable air conditioner. That same top kept rain from being a factor as well. Although I've ridden the Harley through some serious frog-chokers, it certainly can't be considered First Class travel.

But these differences, and any others that relate to the obvious physical differences between the vehicles, pale into insignificance in the face of the single most important consideration: the reaction of motel desk clerks when confronted by a prospective guest who lacks a confirmed reservation. Let me tell you, pull that Mercedes up to the front door of Ollie & Erna's Tourist Court, in the middle of East Nowhere, and Ollie & Erna will find you a room, maybe even one with a Jacuzzi. Rumble up to the same front door on a Harley — not a "chopper," mind you, but a respectable touring model, just like the Shriners ride in their parades — and it can be a very different story. If you're lucky, all you'll get is a mumbled "sorry, no vacancy," despite the obviously empty parking lot. If it's been raining, and your leathers are soaked through, the reaction might be a bit stronger, involving Ollie's 12-gauge, with maybe a Rotweiller thrown in for local color. As The Motor Company's ads say, "Things Are Different On A Harley."

So now, when I travel alone on two wheels, I travel with two crucial items: confirmed reservations at a brand name motel in all of the places I'm likely to want stop on any given night; and a cell phone programmed with the 800 numbers needed to cancel the unneeded rooms before the credit card charge kicks in. This stratagem generally works; the few times I've run into difficulty, whipping out that cell phone and calling the motel's home office has always turned the tide, usually before the call is even connected.

The multiple reservations allow me to adhere to a "the ride is the destination" itinerary, at least until it comes time to actually Get Somewhere. The Somewhere in question is Atlanta, where I'll attend the Furthur Festival. I made the same trip last year, for the same reason, but time and familial constraints forced that journey to be made at a far less leisurely pace than I prefer. Basically, I got on the Interstate and nailed it. During a good chunk of the ride I flew past several entrances to the Blue Ridge Parkway — motorcycle paradise — and recall making a mental note not to be such an idiot next time. Well, this is next time, and the Blue Ridge Parkway is looming large in my plans. I'm also thinking to seek out some live music during the ride down, and some home-style southern cooking, too. And, of course, I'll need to speckle the southeast with reservations. It was time to spend An Hour On The Internet.

Back Pain (3/11/97)

As I lay supine within the narrow confines of the MRI tunnel, ears assaulted by the astonishing racket that's a surprising artifact of that ultra-high tech device, a thought occurred to me: mankind's collective decision to stand upright was made too soon. The brain said "Hey, if you stand up we can use these cool opposable thumbs to make stuff." The spine, dissenting, opined "Maybe so, but it's all we can do right now to keep the central nervous system in position. Make us support the upper body and all hell will break loose." To which the brain replied "Screw you, we're in charge here; now stand up!" and thus was born homo erectus. Of course, for countless millennia the spine has exacted its revenge against the brain, in the form of the low back pain that I share with millions of my fellow homo sapiens. We hapless descendants of homo erectus would be absolutely delighted to move about on all fours, or to crawl on our bellies if it came to that, if it meant freedom from the Revenge of the Vertebrae.

After a quarter-century of back trouble, I decided it might be worthwhile to have a non-invasive peek at what was actually going on in there. My various consultants agreed that a better understanding of why it hurt would be enormously useful in determining a course of treatment. Now, X-Rays, wondrous as they might have seemed to previous generations, can only provide an image of the skeleton and any undigested loose change or hairpins. The MRI (for Magnetic Resonance Imaging), by contrast uses — hold on to your hat — "a nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometer to produce electronic images of specific atoms and molecular structures in solids, especially human cells, tissues, and organs." So, in the interest of both science and personal comfort — for my motto has long been "no pain, no pain" — I endured the minor rigors of the MRI tunnel.

The results, in the way medical results often are, were at once conclusive and ambiguous. The MRI revealed the presence of two herniated disks whose condition called for any of several possible courses of treatment. One, to do nothing at all, had proven ineffective over the years. At the other extreme was surgery, which didn't seem to offer sufficiently advantageous odds. The via media was a combination of exercise (ugh!) and one or more ergonomically-correct gizmos and doodads intended to give aid and comfort to the spine. A proper chair; a corset of some sort; a small person tap dancing on my prone body... who knows what might provide relief!

My osteopath was delighted to provide a diagramed list of exercises (ugh!), but in a remarkable display of frankness admitted that there was no telling what sort of doodad might prove compatible with my own particular condition. That being the case, I offered to research the marketplace and present him with a selection on which to comment. To do so would require An Hour On The Internet.