Q. Are we talking about travelers to Mexico, third world countries or every place?

Most seemed too concerned with eating and getting on their way again to waste any time in idle curiosity about other travelers.

We're talking about travelers with a strike or two against them - a tiny portion of the multitudes passing through.

Transportation officials said yesterday that no personal information about travelers would be collected during the 120-day test beyond what is used in current screening systems.

"There are myths about lost travelers who get help from an old man who they later find out was a dragon."

Each, for all its seductive coziness, is about travelers who feel like foreigners wherever they go.

The prevailing wisdom about travelers who need extended-stay accommodations is that they want all their needs to be met by the hotel itself.

Remember news stories about travelers who thought they could get away with joking about hijacking.

The data about travelers would be kept confidential, although the government could demand to see it in criminal investigations.

And mine are the latter, that's all, about travelers to whom things happen, as things will.