I have never called a radio or television show in my entire life. I have been tempted many times to call a program with an opinion or on occasion an answer to a question.

My days of playing Jeopardy are about over. In my younger days, the answers to difficult questions quickly popped into my mind and were immediately on my tongue. Those days are gone forever, Nouns, names and places seem to linger in the atmosphere and even though I know the answer, it doesn't materialize.

The following incident restored faith in myself.

Lorraine, my beautiful wife and I were driving to the Hamptons on a Saturday morning about 9 a.m. We listen to WBAI every Saturday with Simon Loekle, my former teacher of the Adult Program at Queens College, from 7 to 8:30 a.m. He reads poetry, Shakespeare and assorted classical material. He is a brilliant scholar and a thought provoker.

At 8:30 a.m. David Rothenberg comes on the air. His opening tune is a Jimmy Durante favorite Ya gotta start off each day with a song. He then usually excoriates President Bush for everything and anything. He plays truly great music from the past. Joe Williams, Sarah Vaughan, Dinah Washington, Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday and Peggy Lee are some of his favorites.

Then he plays a call-in game called "Fame is Fleeting!" He names five obscure names from the past and listeners call in with the answers. If they guess correctly they must try to stump him with an equally obscure name from yesterday's headlines. Usually I cannot even get one of the five names he lists.

As we drove along, I was astounded by getting three of the five names. The ones I knew were:

a) Richard Jewell

b) Clarence Iott

c) Lulu McConnell

My reader, I will give you a moment. Are any or all of these names familiar to you?

Time is up! Here are the answers.

a) Richard Jewell was the security guard at the Olympics in Atlanta who was falsely accused of terrorism.

b) Clarence Iott was a 1950's baseball pitcher for the then N.Y. Giants.

c) Lulu McConnell was a panelist on a radio program called It Pays to Be Ignorant from the 1940s.

I asked Lorraine to dial the radio station in the small hope we would get through to Mr. Rothenberg. Lorraine dialed and said it was ringing. She handed me the phone.

Within a moment I was listening to the program on my radio and on my portable cellphone. I was astounded. I identified Clarence "Hooks" Iott and I gave him a name "Ray Poat" also an old-time Giants pitcher. He got it immediately. Old former N.Y. Giant and Brooklyn Dodger fans vividly remember their past heroes.

I must admit it, it gave me a positive charge.

I can still remember and answer questions in a short time span!

Little victories , at this age, feel quite uplifting.