As I head for the curb with 50 pounds of tied and wrapped newspapers on Monday night, I ask myself this thought-provoking question, 'Who is winning this battle, the newspapers or me?'

I am putting my money on the newspapers! I put the piles and piles of newspapers out for recycling, and the next day the papers start infiltrating my home again. Between the humongous New York Times and Newsday there is enough poundage to break the spine of an ordinary human being.

Thank goodness in a moment of sheer sanity I discontinued the Wall Street Journal. I truly could not read all "the news that was fit to print" and then start on Newsday for a clearer view of local events and then enter the world of finance with the Wall Street Journal. It was overkill and I was the chief victim. If you dared ask me, "What's new?" you had better be prepared for a long and serious answer.

Weekends merely emboldened the printers of these papers. Feature columns and advertising by the ton were dropped on my driveway. Lugging them into the house in their multi-plastic lining was no easy chore. On a snowy or rainy day one can risk their life retrieving the papers.

A second serious side question arises," What is the proper attire for going outside in the morning when bringing back the newspapers? Does one have to be fully dressed in the uniform of the working day or can one saunter out in sockless shoes and jeans? Some people may try pajamas and I really don't object. Others may go for the underwear approach. They have to be very quick and on good terms with their neighbors.

Back to the recycling problem. We wouldn't have so much to recycle if we didn't overprint in the first place. Why don't we start conservation at the source? Print less fillers and useless information and there would be less of a problem.

Newspaper and newspaper print comes from the wood of trees. Entire forests must be depleted for the printing of the Sunday Times. How about the words short and concise? They would save a lot of paper, wood, trees and forests.

I am not against a "free press" but even Thomas Jefferson might get a hernia bringing in the papers in the morning and lugging the recyclables out on Monday night in Jericho.

The above propositions do not include my favorite paper: the Syosset-Jericho Tribune and any of the Anton newspapers.