What was going on when I was born?

Some New York City accountants and lawyers are reporting a flood of calls from clients asking whether they risk losing their rentcontrolled or rent-stabilized apartments under a proposed city regulation. The regulation, announced this week by Mayor Koch, would permit the city to evict people from these apartments if they did not pay city income taxes. ''I've received dozens of calls,'' said Errol A. Brett, a lawyer who often represents tenants. Most commonly, he said, the callers had a pied-a-terre in the city but lived elsewhere much of the year, or they lived in a city apartment but called a summer or weekend home their primary residence.

Even the carpet is different. When Donald B. Marron took charge at Paine Webber Inc. almost three years ago, he found the dark burgundy rug on the executive floor at 140 Broadway too drab. He believes symbols are important. He wanted a carpet that reflected a vibrant, spunky company. Before long, off-white carpeting covered the floor. Paine Webber sorely needed new symbols. Three years ago, the brokerage house was sick, better known for its snappy ''Thank You, Paine Webber'' ad slogan than for its skill at managing its own money. Shortly after the 1979 acquisition of Blyth Eastman Dillon & Company, the investment banker, stock market volume erupted and Paine Webber's outdated back office crumbled under the deluge of orders. Never highly profitable, Paine Webber, the parent company of Paine, Webber, Jackson & Curtis, wound up losing $6.9 million in the fiscal year ended Sept. 26, 1980, and teetered on the brink of collapse. One of the more jolting reminders of those days was the $2 million bill for late-night cab rides for employees working late to repair the mess.

There are at least 14,000 toxic-waste dumps in the United States, and one is in this small town of Moreau in the shadow of the Adirondacks. The Caputo pit, as it is known, is neither the most nor the least dangerous of them. Like thousands of other communities with toxic-waste dumps, Moreau will never become a household name like Love Canal or Times Beach. No agency seems likely to buy this town of 12,000 - as the Federal Government did Times Beach, Mo. - and suddenly solve its problem. The story of Moreau - whose dump the Government considers the 140th-worst toxic-waste site in the nation - is not a story of extremes. If there is such a thing as a typical town plagued by toxic waste, it may be this one.

About 10 percent of the nation's adult population has opened individual retirement accounts for 1982, and an additional 5 percent say they plan to do so, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News Poll. The national poll suggested that, by April 11, Americans had put about $30 billion in the tax-free I.R.A. accounts for the 1982 tax year so far, much more than the $18.8 billion total estimated by the Treasury Department for the entire tax year. The Treasury's estimate, made this week, is $10 billion higher than the figure it provided in January. Some economists, such as Jay N. Woodworth, vice president of the Bankers Trust Company, say that the extraordinary surge in the taxexempt I.R.A. accounts could have a profound effect on the nation's economy by increasing the Federal budget deficit because of smaller tax collections, by deflating the nation's money supply and by suppressing the growth of retail sales. Treasury economists acknowledge that their latest estimate may be far off the mark and that inflows into the accounts may be far greater than their own estimates.

A dispatch from Bonn Tuesday about missing toxic wastes included several incorrect references to a privately owned French perfume manufacturer. The company - whose correct name is P. Robertet & Cie. - has never been a subsidiary of Hoffman-Laroche, a Swiss pharmaceutical company, and it has never had any connection with Icmesa, an Italian chemical company, which was the origin of the dioxin wastes discussed in the article.

BY definition, Off Off Broadway is a floating festival of diverse theatrical events, offering something for every taste. This weekend in particular, the scene is alive with promising entertainments. The emphasis is very much on spectacle, but in typical, experimental fashion, the spectacle can be an extravagant musical drawn from the Biblical plagues, Shakespeare transplanted to ancient China or a trio of inspired tomfools. And to even the score, there are new plays by very young dramatists and a restorative revival of a drama by Tennessee Williams. Two prolific theaters are showcasing a range of work by favorite sons and daughters. In the vast expanse of La Mama Annex is a musical called ''The Plagues,'' written by Eve Merriam and Tom O'Horgan, and directed by Mr. O'Horgan. In residence on other La Mama stages are Paul Zimet's Talking Band, doing an ensemble play with music titled ''Hot Lunch Apostles,'' and Harris Yulin, a Broadway star, playing the title buncombe artist in Richard Ploetz's ''Barnum's Last Life.'' At the nearby Theater for the New City, 162 Second Avenue, at 10th Street, Leonard Melfi, a graduate of both La Mama and Theater for the New City, is showcasing a new epic musical, ''Rosetti's Apologies,'' while on another New City stage, Stuart Sherman is demonstrating his one-man, world-in-a-suitcase art with a performance piece called ''13 Spectacle'' (tickets for both $4; information: 254-1109).

''Phone users in the three boroughs are every bit as much New Yorkers as those in Manhattan and the Bronx.'' -Councilman Steven S. Orlow, on new area code planned for Brooklyn, Queens and Staten Island. (B3:3.)

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission today delayed restarting the Salem 1 nuclear plant in South Jersey until questions about the quality of the management at the plant were resolved. During a three-hour meeting to discuss whether the plant should be restarted after the failure of safety equipment in February, Commissioner Victor Gilinsky said the agency should consider stripping the utility of its license. He suggested that the top mangaement of Public Service Electric and Gas Company, the licensee and partowner of the plant, should be dismissed. "We need new leadership," Mr. Gilinsky said. "I'm talking about the corporate level," he added, saying that the incident involved "knowing neglect of duty."

The stock market made another strong advance yesterday in active trading, with the Dow Jones industrial average registering its second consecutive closing high. At the end of trading, the Dow average was up 8.61 points, to 1,165.25. In the last six sessions the blue-chip barometer of 30 prominent companies' stocks has surged more than 51 points, mainly because of declining interest rates and favorable economic news. The two other leading market indicators ended the session at new highs for the fourth day in a row. The New York Stock Exchange's composite index of 1,500 common stocks rose 0.80, to 90.84, while Standard & Poor's 500-stock index climbed 1.34, to 158.11.

New York City detectives, working from their major clue, a bloodsmudged fingerprint, arrested a 20-year-old man yesterday in the fatal stabbing of a bank executive at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel last Sept. 22. The victim, Kathleen J. Williams, was found in a stairwell on the 19th floor of the west wing of the hotel. The fingerprint, the authorities said, was left by the slayer on the victim's name card as he searched her wallet for money. The seven-month investigation, in which thousands of prints were checked, ended at 1:30 A.M. yesterday with the arrest of Juan E. Robles.

Roy L. Williams, who was convicted in December of conspiring to bribe a Senator, offered to resign as president of the teamsters' union today in exchange for remaining free on bail while he appeals the conviction. An attorney for the hospitalized Mr. Williams, Raymond G. Larroca, made the offer to Judge Prentice H. Marshall of Federal District Court here at a special hearing. The hearing was held shortly after the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit ruled that Mr. Williams must report to a Federal prison hospital in Springfield, Mo., on Friday. 'He Will Not Survive' Mr. Larroca told Judge Marshall that Mr. Williams ''is convinced that he will not survive incarceration'' and that ''he will resign his positions if that is what he has to do.''

WHO better than John Constable could inaugurate ''Britain Salutes New York,'' the free-form festival of British art, music, theater, dance, literature, movies, photography and video, which opened this week and will continue through much of the summer? ''Constable's England,'' opening tomorrow at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, is in that context about as well timed as an exhibition can be. More than anyone else, John Constable (1776-1837) is Mr. English Landscape. (His chief rival in that regard, J.M.W. Turner, had a pan-European activity that puts him in a less local category.) Constable was reared in an English landscape. He made his name with an English landscape. In times of stress, he even said his prayers in front of one of his English landscapes. In fact, he did everything a man can do with an English landscape except eat it.