The hotel business is a pretty good way to become a billionaire. Not as good as high-tech, energy or some other industries, but not bad, especially if your name is Pritzker, Carlson, Tisch or Marriott. Those four families placed 17 names on the recently published list of The 400 Richest Americans in the current issue of Forbes magazine. In all, 30 people with direct ties to the hotel industry made the list.

The Pritzker family had 11 names on the list, totaling $22 billion in net worth. Tom and Penny Pritzker led the way with $2.3 billion and $2.1 billion, respectively. Barbara Carlson Gage, Marilyn Carlson Nelson and their families, heirs to the Curt Carlson and Carlson Companies fortune, have a combined worth of $4 billion. The Tisch family of Loews Hotels have two people on the list—Joan ($3.4 billion) and Wilma ($1.9 billion)—but no sign of prominent hotelier Jon Tisch. I’m sure he’s not hurting. The Marriott brothers, Richard and Bill, have a combined worth of $3.5 billion.

Other prominent current or one-time hoteliers on the list: Ty Warner ($4.5 billion), Robert Holding ($4.2 billion), Wayne Huizenga ($2.1 billion), Dean White ($1.4 billion), Thomas Flatley ($1.3 billion), Barron Hilton ($1 billion) and Robert Johnson ($1 billion). Some of these guys—Warner, Huizenga and Johnson, in particular—made their fortunes in other businesses before turning to the hotel business.

Casinos are another particularly good way to make a billion dollars, or at least hang on to the billions you made in other industries. Sheldon Adelson, who’s number-three on the list (behind Bill Gates and Warren Buffett), made tons of money in the trade show business before cashing out and getting into casino hotels, most notably with The Venetian in Las Vegas. The magazine says the 73-year-old Adelson is worth $20.5 billion, not bad but still less than half of Buffett’s $46-billion fortune.

Other casino industry magnates on the list: Kirk Kerkorian ($9 billion), Steve Wynn ($2.6 billion), Donald Trump ($2.9 billion), Phil Ruffin ($1.4 billion) and Bill Boyd ($1.2 billion).

Does any of this information have deep meaning? Probably not, but it’s good to dream.

This day, the fifth anniversary of the cowardly attacks against the U.S. by a group of determined but deranged zealots, is one in which all of us take a least a moment of two to reflect on what this pivotal moment in history means to us, our families and our nation. Given the impact of that day and the immediate effect it had on all business, but especially travel, it’s hard to imagine how far we’ve rebounded.

A series of two photos in today’s Honolulu Advertiser provides the stark contrast. One photo shows popular Kuhio Beach a few days after 9/11. The beach was nearly empty. The next image shows the same beach just a few days ago, packed cheek by jowl with sunbathers, the vast majority of whom were tourists. The accompanying story explains how the fragile Hawaiian tourism business bounced back dramatically from those dark days five years ago. Occupancies on Oahu have hovered near 90 percent all this year, with corresponding high rates.

It’s hard to discern the lesson we can take from this scenario (as well as similar ones in markets like New York City and south Florida). Does it show the resiliency of Americans? Or their passion to travel, despite the built-in dangers and hassles and the effects of a so-so economy? Or the cleverness of the hospitality business to get people to forget their troubles, even for a little while?

The answer, of course, is that’s it’s probably a little of all three reasons with some other ones I didn’t think of. The real lesson is that business, like life, is fragile. What’s here and taken for granted today may be gone tomorrow. And while it’s never right to be reckless or unthoughtful, there’s a lot of truth in the old cliched adage that you should live every day to its fullest. Kiss your spouse as often as possible, dote on your kids and grandkids, be bold in business and, above all, be fair and kind to all your associates, partners, peers and employees. We don’t know what tomorrow brings.

From across the ocean comes word that those tuneful, bellicose Gallagher brothers at the helm of the nearly famous rock group Oasis are planning to develop hotels in the United States. Theirs may be a notion whose time has come—and gone.

Word is that Liam and Noel Gallagher, those perpetually cheeky Brits who formed Oasis in the early ’90s, plan to use titles of their hits as room themes in hotels in Miami, New York and Hollywood. If they succeed, they’ll join such other media magnets in the hotel business as U2’s Bono and chronic celebutante Nicky Hilton.

According to a source quoted in Britain’s Daily Star newspaper, those fabulous, fighting Gallaghers, whose best albums ring with catchy guitar pop, plan to name each of their hotels Supernova Heights, after Noel’s former home in North London. They are rumored to have gotten backing from some financial heavyweights in the U.S.

At the same time, their plan to install alcohol and cigarettes in each room of their New York hotel, lending credence to the theme of “Cigarettes and Alcohol,” one of their better-known songs, may not fly; non-smoking is a growing trend, after all.

For all we know, the next rock figure to propose a hotel chain will be George Clinton, mastermind of the psychedelic soul band Parliament-Funkadelic. Clinton could be trolling for guests eager to stay in a hotel where they can give up the funk, like Parliament urges, and “Tear the Roof off the Sucker.”