Over the weekend I read about the government's plan for a new citizen spying program - Operation TIPs - and it said postal workers might end up on the front lines of the war on terrorism after all.

(The U.S. Postal Service initially said its employees wouldn't participate, but then agreed to meet with the Justice Department to talk things over, so who knows?)

When it starts in late summer or early fall, the Terrorism Information and Prevention system is intended to catch bad guys, but in the same way that very nice dolphins are sometimes unintentionally snagged in tuna nets, I fear being caught in the government's sweep.

I'm not a terrorist sending away for dirty-bomb making kits, but I am not without my secrets, either:

I let my New Republic subscription lapse years ago.

I get US Weekly.

I receive very little personal mail - but hundreds of catalogs.

I can just hear my postman diming me out now: ``You wouldn't believe the number of UPS boxes she gets. Yesterday I saw one from the Franklin Mint.''

The Justice Department insists it doesn't want the citizen spies to collect information from people's homes, just ``public places'' or ``public areas,'' but sometimes people take things into their own hands.

It's easy to imagine some vigilante cable guy taking the opportunity to look around while he's diagnosing your TV's problem as ``idiopathic,'' as they say in the medical world when they mean ``we don't know what the heck is causing this.''

What if Cable Man comes in the late afternoon - at the tail end of the 9 a.m.-5 p.m. window you were given - and notices the bed is still unmade and the breakfast dishes are in the sink? Or he takes note of the fact that your young children seem very familiar with the E! channel, and passes that information along to the government? Or, worse yet, your mother?

And the pizza delivery man? He seems friendly, but perhaps a bit loose-lipped. Maybe I don't want everyone at the Justice Department knowing I'm a person who sometimes orders Hawaiian pizza, or that I get diet Coke along with my two larges with extra cheese and a side of CinnaStix.

But the scariest part of TIPs is it will empower your neighbors. The old lady across the street who doesn't appreciate the hands-off approach you take to your lawn now has the ear of the government:

``I tell you,'' she'll whisper into the phone, ducking so as not to be seen through her window, ``there's no mowing going on over there. I think she's too busy plotting against the government. And her music is awfully loud. It may be al-Qaeda's greatest hits.''

I've heard train conductors also might be encouraged to report any suspicious behavior. ``Suspicious behavior'' I'm not worried about, but ``poor manners'' they might get me on. OK, I admit it: I was on the T the other day and I pretended not to notice a pregnant woman because I was really tired (from taking care of my own two children).

And, yes, I forgot to bring my book, so I read the Wall Street Journal over a fellow passenger's shoulder and then asked him to ``hold on a minute'' when he tried to turn the page. And I eat while riding. And, when I'm above ground, I talk on my cell phone.

Maybe I do deserve to be turned in after all.