We have enough to worry about here in this city : a taxi assailant, coyote attacks not far from the city, and now a brush-fire in Queens messing up the LIRR service between Jamaica and Queens (I thought those fires happened in open wooded areas)

Now here is the scariest of all — Andrew Speaker, a 31-year-old attorney, traveled on a transatlantic flight while infected with an antibiotic-resistant strain of tuberculosis. Not only did he fly into New York, but spent some time in Bellevue. Now, public health officials are trying to track down the people who flew on the flight with Speaker. I don’t know about anyone else, but I am praying this illness has not spread. With the airborne nature of this contagion, and straphangers crushed inside subway cars, many of whom cough in each others’ faces, let alone put their germy hands on poles, this has disastrous potential. Have I planted seeds of paranoia in anyone’s hypochondriac imagination. Just do what I have always done: wash hands as soon as possible after disembarking from any form of mass transit.