Hi, I'm trying to simplify some JS code that uses closures but I am getting nowhere (probably because I'm not grokking closures)

I have some code that looks like this:

var server = http.createServer(function (request, response) {
var httpmethods = {

       "GET": function() { 
                      alert('GET')
                     },
       "PUT": function() {
                      alert('PUT')
                     }
       };
});

And I'm trying to simplify it in this way:

var server = http.createServer(function (request, response) {
var httpmethods = {

        "GET": function() { 
                      alertGET()
                     },
        "PUT": function() {
                      alertPUT()
                     }
       };
});

function alertGET() {
        alert('GET');
}

function alertPUT() {
        alert('PUT');
} 

Unfortunately that doesnt seem to work... Thus: - what am I doing wrong? - is it possible to do this? - how?

TIA

-- MV