What was going on when I was born?

T HE Kean administration's program to develop an economy based on high technology moved out of the talking stages last week, when monetary awards were announced for expanding the industrial uses of ceramics and finding new ways to dispose of hazardous and toxic wastes. Two of five proposed centers for collaborative research between academia and industry - all would expand existing programs in the state's higher-education network - were named to receive funds from an initial $4 million allocation in the current state budget. The Piscataway-based Rutgers University Center for Ceramics Research, begun two years ago with a National Science Foundation grant, was awarded $1 million in state money, and the proposed Center for Hazardous and Toxic Waste Management at the New Jersey Institute of Technology in Newark was named to receive $558,000. David M. Goodman, planning assistant for the Governor's Commission on Science and Technology, said that future grants would be for food technology, $585,200; biotechnology, $717,800, and telematics, $1,170,000.

With the help of a little mixing, a little psychology and perhaps one of his familiar long, cold stares, Al Arbour recorded his 500th regular-season coaching victory tonight as his Islanders beat the Vancouver Canucks, 6-4. Was it because Arbour teamed Brent Sutter on a line for the first time this season with Bobby Nystrom and John Tonelli, even though Sutter was returning after an 11-game absence with a hand injury? The line produced four goals, including a pair by Sutter. Or was it because Arbour lifted his long-time goalie, Billy Smith, in the second period after the Canucks had come back from a 4-1 deficit to tie at 4-4?

Ihate to say it, but a lot of people love fakes. Given the choice, they prefer them to the real thing. Fakes are funny, they think, and unlike the genuine article they are the easiest thing in the world to talk about. Those same people often love fakers, too, and they see them as the lone riders of the art world. Fakers, they think, are sexy, mischievous, insubordinate outlaws, who like nothing better than to puncture the stuffed shirt and watch the sawdust run out.

Pat Ahern of Breckenridge, Colo., lost an opportunity to win an Olympic medal in Nordic combined skiing today when controversial rulings by the jury canceled two rounds of jumping and wiped out his jumps, two of the longest of the competition. Officials canceled the rounds in the 70-meter jump, the second time with only four skiers left, because the competitors were jumping so far that the jury considered it dangerous. Both cancellations nullified strong jumps by Ahern. When the competition was completed, he could manage only a tie for 16th with his subsequent jumps.

T HE player was lethargic in practice and erratic in games. He seemed to be in financial trouble, borrowing money from teammates and fending off creditors. The symptoms were classic and the team president suspected drug abuse. He contacted a private investigator. Carl Scheer, the president of the Denver Nuggets, tells the story in measured but firm tones and does not identify the player, currently on the Nugget roster. The investigator, Scheer said, interviewed friends and associates and uncovered no more than ''sketchy'' evidence of drug abuse. Scheer had a ''semi-confrontation'' with the player and alerted the National Basketball Association security office of his suspicions. A league security representative, Scheer said, is ''closely monitoring'' the situation.

BEIRUT, Lebanon T HE most frightening thing about being in Beirut last week was not the widespread shelling of civilian apartment houses or the window-rattling bombardments of the battleship New Jersey. Rather, it was watching a society come apart, with people running through the streets in panic not knowing where the fighting was coming from, where it would lead or when it would stop. The status quo that had developed as a result of the Israeli invasion had collapsed. ''People are living hour by hour now,'' remarked Tammam Salam, head of the Makassad Welfare Society. ''Everyone is lost - it all happened so fast.'' On Monday morning the Lebanese Army was routinely fighting with the Shiite Amal militia in West Beirut for the fifth straight day when the word went out, true or not, that the army was planning to send Christian-led reinforcements into the predominantly Moslem western half of the capital. Within minutes, Shiite and Druse militiamen were ordered to seize all Lebanese Army positions. Aided by sympathetic army soldiers, the Moslem militiamen took control of their half of the city within 21 hours.

-SEVEN private lawyers in the state have joined a new effort to help unclog Connecticut's backed-up court system - by serving on the bench. The lawyers began work this month as part-time ''trial referees.'' The referees make findings in nonjury civil cases that will be reviewed by a Superior Court judge. The state began the experiment to free full-time judges for jury cases, according to Larry Moore, director of communications for the State Judicial Department. Because of the backlog, plaintiffs have often waited for years for such cases to go to trial.

NEWARK T HE 64-year-old, two-pack-a-day smoker was admitted to the hospital on a Sunday complaining of weakness, a recent 20-pound weight loss and diarrhea two weeks earlier. The admitting physician found evidence suggesting a mass or fluid in his right lung. Following some routine tests, 15 more-sophisticated diagnostic procedures were ordered. They were completed by Thursday and confirmed the initial assessment: lung cancer. Four days after that, specialists on the hospital's tumor board recommended a course of treatment. The review of the case began just as the medical students had come to expect, with the senior doctor's skeptical questions.

THE lobby of the Colonnade at 347 West 57th Street had two architects, landscape, art and marketing consultants and a budget that exceeded $500,000. Trees for the interior were shade-grown for months in Florida to give them time to become acclimated and four paintings and a sculpture were purchased. At Museum Tower, 15 West 53d Street, the lobby has an architect, a graphic designer for the logo, a furniture consultant and an art consultant. The polished bronze revolving door cost $85,000. Art, including a painting by Kenneth Noland, sculptures by Beverly Pepper and Anthony Caro and lithographs by Picasso and Matisse, cost an additional $200,000.

Will Crutchfield writes frequently about music and musicians. N ew York is currently having a small spate of pops concerts. Not pop concerts - they happen all the time and a cluster of three or four close together would be nothing to remark on. Pops, with an ''s,'' is a more narrowly defined brand of popular music, one which is experiencing a surge of activity in America that has been slower to make itself felt in New York than elsewhere. ''Pops,'' though also popular and probably more diverse in content than the pop music current at any given time, is specialized in sound and in the forum for its presentation: the standard ''classical'' symphony orchestra. ''Pops,'' according to Erich Kunzel, who will lead the Cincinnati Pops Orchestra at Carnegie Hall on Wednesday, ''is anything from Broadway medleys to Strauss waltzes to Cleo Laine,'' who will be singing with him here. ''It's also standard symphonic works that have become so familiar that 'classical' programmers don't want them.'' Mr. Kunzel should know. In addition to his Cincinnati post he holds musical directorships of the Toronto Symphony Promenades, the Rochester Philharmonic Pops, the Winnipeg Symphony Pops, and the Indianapolis Pops. He also appears annually with the Cleveland Orchestra, the Chicago Symphony and the Boston Pops. He spends most of his remaining time guest conducting and recording, making well over 100 appearances each season.

To encourage the public's appreciation and enjoyment of important structures in Hartford, the Hartford Architecture Conservancy is sponsoring four lectures this month that will be given in buildings of historic and architectural interest. Judith Rohrer, visiting instructor in art at Wesleyan University, will lead a discussion on the language of architecture at Christ Church Cathedral on Church Street on Wednesday.

I n a play where just about everything goes wrong on purpose, certain things must not happen. For example, the parlor door on the stage set of ''Noises Off,'' the hit Broadway comedy, must not fall from its hinges in the middle of Act I. How would the play make any sense without a good sturdy parlor door to fling open and slam shut? And yet, as the cast looked on all amazed, the parlor door did fall from its hinges during Act I of a recent performance. It happened when Jim Piddock - who plays a comically paint-daubed stagehand - made his entrance through the door.