He ain't heavy.

There's a deli down the street from my office on the corner of 10th Avenue and 47th Street. It's a dirty little place that'll make you a bacon, egg and cheese sandwich and dispense thick black coffee, where you can pick up a turkey sandwich on a stale kaiser roll along with a bottle of seltzer.

In short, it's a deli like about ten thousand others in New York.

The thing I like best about the joint is its name: 5 Brothers Deli.

Brothers and Deli seem to go together in New York like Original went with Rays went with Pizza.

There are more brothers than the Karamazovs.

There's Brothers Delis numbering from Two to Nine.

I think this all grew out of a place over on 9th Avenue called 7 Brothers Deli.

They grew to be successful and other Delis began to Brotherize their names.

So there's a 2 Brothers Deli out in Flatbush. A 3 Brothers Deli at 900 8th Avenue. A 4 Brothers Deli at 4402 White Plains Road in the Bronx.

Like I said there's a 5 Brothers Deli on 10th and 47th. A 6 Brothers Deli at 689 10th Avenue. A 7 Brothers Deli over at 719 9th.

There doesn't seem to be a local 8 Brothers Deli, though there is one in Philadelphia. Appropriately enough, "the city of Brotherly Love."

As for 9 Brothers. They're a Circus Act in Yonkers. Right now riding unicycles while juggling.