Check your moles!

"Popular Mechanics" by Raymond Carver

Discuss the title of the story. The original title was "Mine." Which do you think is more effective?

Discuss yourself! Oh wait, you can't, because it takes two people to discuss something! However, I digress, what I believe the title to be all about (and this is just my speculation seeing as I haven't checked it against a reliable source) is that when looking at "popular," we think of the star quarterback that cheerleader you had a crush on, but she never knew you existed in high school and now you're making a mediocre salary, living in a mediocre home with your mediocre life while she turned to stripping for extra money in college and is now in a halfway house, recovering from her drug addiction. Yet, "popular" in it's most basic terms, means "of people." So, combined with mechanics, which could mean, the workings of something, or literally a machine, we get a title that implies "how people work" and "these people are machines, dead and robotic." I'm either very close, or laughably incorrect. As far as effectiveness between the two titles, "Mine" makes the ending a little less ambiguous, I feel, but "Popular Mechanics" is more mentally stimulating and therefore title domination.