TERRI SCHLICHENMEYER The Bookworm Sez Advertisement

So there you were in your righteous Torino, pulling into the school parking lot, ready to face the day. You were just about to turn the radio off and get to class, when the DJ spins "Rock the Boat" by the Hues Corporation. You sit there a minute 'cause, man, that record is solid.

As the "wooo hooo hooo"s fade out, you turn off the music, and start scopin'. Seems like all the chicks are wearing that Dorothy Hamill look this year, doesn't it? And monster sideburns are in with the dudes.

Sound like your senior year? Right on. Then you need to read "The Great Funk" by Thomas Hine. It's Ace, baby.

They called it the "Me Decade," maybe because so much time was spent raising personal consciousness. In the 1970s the Beatles broke up, the Republicans broke into the Watergate Hotel, and Archie Bunker broke barriers on TV. Women marched for the Equal Rights Amendment while Phyllis Schlafly spoke against it -- and won.

We drove Pintos, Gremlins, LTDs and station wagons, but we coveted TransAms and Millennium Falcons. We dressed ourselves in plaid pants, maxi skirts, the Annie Hall look, white disco suits and his-and-hers outfits ... that is, we dressed ourselves in those things when we weren't streaking.

The Force was with us in the 1970s, raindrops fell on our heads and we took newspapers to the theater so we could keep dry like Janet. We were mad as you-know-what but we weren't going to take it any more. We laughed with Mary, we loved Hawkeye and Mork, and we couldn't believe we ate the whole thing.

Disco sucked or didn't, depending on whether you wanted to listen to KISS and the Rolling Stones, or K.C. and the Sunshine Band and Donna Summer. Check that -- even Mick and the boys did disco. Ugh.

Paneling was in back in the 70s, but that woody darkness didn't stop us from enjoying harvest gold, avocado green, orange, or burnt sienna-colored appliances in our kitchens. In the living room we had bold stripes, floral patterns, "Keep On Truckin'" blacklight posters, white shag carpeting -- and plants ... lots of plants.

But if we didn't have a thumb for all that greenery, we knew there was one thing we could easily care for: a pet rock.

Whew!

Springing from his prior book "Populuxe," author Thomas Hine hits the highlights of the 1970s with a pop-historian's eye and plenty of pictures, advertisements (You've come a long way, baby) and shockers (from 1970 to 1972, gasoline averaged 36 cents a gallon).

Although this book isn't quite as pop-culturish as I wished it had been, and there is little on toys and games of the '70s, "The Great Funk" almost guarantees a few evenings of hey-remember-this-ing for Baby Boomers and -- although we were once told never to trust anyone over 30 -- a source of glee to anyone under age 35.

Jinkies! Don't be a spaz. If you can dig it, "The Great Funk" is a great use of your Christmas bread 'cause it's Dy-no-MITE.

"The Great Funk" by Thomas Hine, Sarah Crichton Books / FSG, $30, 241 pages.