What was going on when I was born?

Storer Communications Inc. yesterday accepted an improved $2.03 billion acquisition offer from Kohlberg, Kravis, Roberts & Company, while turning down a new bid made by the Comcast Corporation valued at $2.1 billion. Julian Brodsky, chief financial officer of Comcast, a cable company based in Bala-Cynwyd, Pa., said he was ''amazed and disappointed'' with Storer's decision to accept the lower bid. Under the Kohlberg, Kravis offer, shareholders would receive $91 a share in cash as well as a warrant to buy shares of stock in the company estimated to be worth an additional $3 a share, while Comcast's package of cash and stock was valued at $98 a share. Offer Worth More Paul Tierney, a member of the Storer board, conceded that the Comcast offer appeared to be worth about $4 a share more than Kohlberg, Kravis's new bid. But, he said, it would have been less favorable to Storer's shareholders on an after-tax basis. ''This was a good offer,'' Mr. Tierney said of the new Kohlberg, Kravis bid, but he agreed that the Comcast offer was also a good one.

An international labor delegation charged today that ''critical modifications'' in the design of the Union Carbide Corporation's plant in Bhopal, India, did not appear in diagrams released by the company and probably contributed to the gas leak that killed more than 2,000 people last December. The delegation, a 12-member team sent to India by two international labor federations, also said that management decisions to eliminate a maintenance supervisor position and to install a safety scrubber too small to handle a major gas leak contributed to the disaster. The delegation, whose findings were based on interviews with workers, attributed the accident to failures by the management of Union Carbide and its Indian subsidiary, Union Carbide India Ltd., to properly operate and maintain the plant. The Water Factor One of the most disputed aspects of the accident has been the question of how water was able to enter a storage tank containing the pesticide ingredient methyl isocyanate. The introduction of the water set off an uncontrollable chemical reaction that released the toxic fumes.

International Japan's Prime Minister urged Congress not to pass protectionist legislation, and he called on Japanese citizens to support his new program to increase imports. He also said other countries must help resolve the imbalance in international trade. [Page D1.] The White House reacted coolly to the Tokyo program, noting that it would take three years to become fully effective, and a number of Senators were skeptical. [D11.] The U.S. deficit in trade with Japan was a record $4.57 billion in June and $13.4 billion over all, the second highest on record, the Commerce Department said. [D11.] ''Critical modifications'' in the design of the Bhopal plant that do not appear in diagrams released by Union Carbide probably contributed to the disaster there, an international labor delegation charged. It based its findings on interviews with workers. [D1.]

Representative Dan Rostenkowski, President Reagan's most important Congressional ally on tax legislation, said today that the President's proposals for changing the Federal income tax system would be ''far too generous'' to wealthy Americans. The Illinois Democrat, who is the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, said the legislation to be developed by his committee this fall would ''give middle-income working families a greater proportional share of tax relief.'' In a luncheon speech to the National Press Club, Mr. Rostenkowski expressed his personal views on tax matters more thoroughly than he had done at any other time publicly since the President submitted his tax plan to Congress two months ago. 'Very Much Alive' ''The quest for tax reform is very much alive,'' he declared, despite the current deadlock over the budget deficit. ''One day soon, we're going to raise taxes,'' he said, adding that, when the day eventually comes, the country will need ''a new tax code that gives us the revenue base to do it without hitting anyone or any business unfairly.''

PAIRING food and wine, like matching ties and shirts, was a less intimidating task a generation ago. In the same way that striped ties called for solid shirts and solid shirts meant sporting striped ties, everyone knew, with a reassuring certainty, that red wines went with meat and white wines went with fish. It was, admittedly, an oversimplification, but sticking to these rules meant not being embarrassed in polite company. By contrast, look at the muddled wine and food situation today. Repeating the incantation ''red wine with meat'' is little help when the dish is grilled duck breast under a roasted sweet pepper sauce studded with pine nuts and seasoned with fresh coriander. Or how about fusilli with radicchio and pancetta in a pink tomato-cream sauce? Not only has food become more complex as chefs of different nationalities borrow from one another's cupboards for inspiration, but also the selection of wines in restaurants and shops has expanded tremendously. There are labels from Australia, Chile, Hungary, Spain, Rumania and Argentina, to name a few, along with wines from hitherto unknown (at least to the wine world) regions in the United States, France and Italy. Then, too, there are new blends of old grapes, such as white zinfandels and blush wines.

The Defense Department announced today that it had resumed contract payments to the General Dynamics Corporation after withholding $437.8 million in a dispute over the costs of weapon programs. Everett Pyatt, Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Shipbuilding and Logistics, said that payments to General Dynamics began last Thursday after a 130-day suspension imposed because the company was found to have been submitting improper charges to the Pentagon. Mr. Pyatt said the suspension was being lifted because General Dynamics had improved its management and accounting procedures. The company is the nation's third-ranking contractor for military equipment, following the McDonnell Douglas Corporation and the Rockwell International Corporation.

Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone appealed to the United States Congress today not to pass protectionist legislation, and he called on Japanese citizens to cooperate with his Government's plan to increase imports. In a televised news conference, Mr. Nakasone said Japan faces ''a critical stage in the war against protectionism.'' He declared: ''If protectionism wins out, the world economy will be thrown into chaos. So we have formulated this program to fight for the promotion of free trade with all our might.''

Insurance companies that provide general liability coverage for business are just now recovering from debilitating price wars and a drop in investment income. But they cannot seem to shake another threat to their well-being: an inability to come even close to predicting payouts on policy claims. Fireman's Fund, the insurance subsidiary of the American Express Company, for instance, said last week that it had beefed up its loss reserves by $187 million to pay unexpectedly large claims already made and anticipated. Fireman's Fund was but the latest insurer to bolster its reserves, which reduces profits.

WHEN the 39 hostage Americans from Trans World Airlines Flight 847 were released last month and flown to West Germany, television reports described their reception as ''a hero's welcome.'' President Reagan had earlier referred to Robert Dean Stethem, the Navy diver slain during the incident, as ''an American hero.'' Indeed, the word ''hero'' was repeated so often in connection with the hostages that one of the group, Thomas Cullins, was moved to observe: ''We did nothing that was in my definition of a hero.'' In an era, then, in which, as Mr. Reagan put it in his State of the Union Message, this country is ''poised for greatness'' with heroes at every turn, Americans seem at a loss for a clear understanding of the term. It is applied with little concern for distinctions in types of heroism or in the circumstances under which heroic qualities are evinced. This confusion may have been demonstrated most vividly when the United States Army, following the Grenada invasion two years ago, awarded more medals than it had soldiers on the island.

The United States Steel Corporation reported yesterday a strong second-quarter performance in its steel unit, even though profits over all dipped 5 percent from the same period a year ago. Profits from its Marathon oil and gas operations declined slightly. The Pittsburgh company said it earned $133 million, or 93 cents a share, compared with $140 million, or $1.04 a share. Last year's profit was buoyed, however, by $27 million in extraordinary gains from the early repurchase of debt.

Rene Verdon, the first professional chef on the White House staff, was putting the finishing touches to the shrimp aspic he had just unmolded in the small kitchen of his San Francisco home. ''If I had been a 'yes' man, I might still be in the White House,'' he said. Instead, 19 years after leaving the President's employ, and at the age of 60, he has become one of the culinary traditions of his adopted city. Hired from the Carlyle Hotel in New York in 1961 by Jacqueline Kennedy to cook for the family and for official functions - the White House had been using a caterer - he stayed on when the Johnsons arrived. But, according to Mr. Verdon, he found it increasingly difficult to make the compromises between what the First Family wanted to serve and what he thought was appropriate. ''The Johnsons liked to have certain foods, but I think people coming to the White House are not expecting hamburgers, chili con queso or spareribs,'' he said. ''Those foods belong to the land, they do not belong in the dining room.''

When Wilton H. Jones won a $250,000 contract to develop a word processing program for personal computers for the Connecticut Mutual Life Insurance Company in 1982, he had no idea the software would make him the head of a successful business. ''I didn't even think I'd have a company,'' he recalled yesterday. But the software turned out to be Multimate, one of the most popular programs of its kind, and the Multimate International Corporation, of which Mr. Jones is president, was so successful that he will no longer have it after all.