A THOUGHT FROM THE FUTURE


It was 3:28 AM when Melvin’s brain groggly became active. He was bothered by a very bad cold that prevented comfortable sleep. He thought it was strange that in the year 2049 Scientists had finally developed ways to prevent the majority of diseases that plagued the human race but they had not been able to eliminate the common cold virus. The lowly cold had never left mankind. And that was the ailment that was bothering Melvin. It was the most sever cold he had ever had. No amount of medicine made the blocked sinus passage clear up or the aching in his head to leave him.


But all the physical unpleasantness of the cold was not what was bothering Melvin. It was the thought that he lovely family in Mossyrock, Washington was suffering with the same ailment. Why should it be that both Melvin and his family should suffer from the same ailment at the same time? The similarity of the aliment and its timing was obvious to Melvin because he and his family spend a lot of time on the Wireless Communication System. The symptoms had developed simultaneously between Melvin and his family over the last couple of days. Why should that be?
Melvin thought he would get on line with his family and discuss this strange phenomena with them. But first Breakfast.


Melvin went to the kitchen where he placed his finger on the Kitchen Key Pad and thought of scrambled eggs and bacon. Almost immediately the food storage unit opened and a mechanical arm reached in and gently picked up two eggs and placed them on the counter. The arm then reached back into the food storage unit and picked up three slabs of bacon and placed them on to a hot plate on the electronic cooking unit. In just a minute or two the bacon started to sizzle. Melvin knew the fragrance of cooking bacon was filling the air. Unfortunately his blocked nose did not allow him to smell the desirable scent as it raised up from the bacon sizzling on the hot pad.


The mechanical arm then cracked the two eggs into a bowl and beat them until they were fluffy. The arm then deposited the yellow fluff on the hot pad next to the bacon.


The Key Pad was placed on the market several years ago. The engineers at Compudyne had developed a Key Pad that could read the mind of anyone who touched it. The Key Pad replaced the old style keyboard that was connected to the electronics of the house. No longer did Melvin have to type in what he wanted the house to do. All he had to do was touch the Key Pad and think what he wanted the house to do. The Pad read his mind and things got done.
Within minutes Melvin’s kitchen served his breakfast on a plate on the table.


One of the symptoms of this terrible ailment was a closed nose. The blockage was so sever that swallowing was almost impossible. Melvin had to develop a new way to swallow with his mouth open. Swallowing with his mouth closed popped his ear drums. Thank goodness for Melvin’s taste buds. Even thought swallowing was difficult the eggs and bacon tasted delicious.
Melvin touched the kitchen pad and thought the dishes into the dish washer. He though of a shower and the shower turned on and the temperature was adjusted to Melvin’s thoughts.
Melvin stepped into he shower and was immediately drenched with warm water. The temperature was to his liking as he had mentally controlled it by touching one of the Compudyne key pads in the house. An instant later he was sprayed with soap suds. The soap had been developed several years ago. It contained micro scrubbing bubbles that gently scrubbed his body. Melvin laid his chin on the shaving control pad. An arm holding a safety razor moved out of the wall and gently removed all of Melvin’s whiskers. A quick rinsing and drying and Melvin was ready to face the day. Although facing the day with his terrible cold was not a pleasant thing.


Along with the pain in his head, the blocked nose and the cough in his chest he noticed that his right index finger felt funny. He looked at his finger thinking that he might have a splinter in it but could not find anything. Oh well it was not much of a bother until he placed it on the Compudyne computer key pad. That’s when his finger felt most like it had a splinter.
Melvin has some business to attend to that would keep him busy for most of the morning. He thought that he might contact his family after lunch.

Melvin dressed and moved to he easy chair. He brought out his brand spanking new Compudyne Computer Key Pad and placed his finger on it. The Compudyne Computer Key Pad was a tremendous step forward in computer technology. The Computer was no more that an inch long by half inch wide and about a half inch thick. It was attached to the Key Pad. The whole thing slipped on the index finger. The Computer generated a 10 by 14 holograph display screen. Even in the brightest of rooms the display screen was easily read.


He thought of his Holograph Computer Screen. An instant later it was up and in front of him. He mentally adjusted its size and location.


He thought the words of several letters and then sent them over the World Wide Wireless Network to the recipients. He did some mental bookkeeping and played a game or two and then it was time to contact his family.


Melvin placed his finger in the Compudyne Computer Key Pad and thought his family’s address. In an instance he found their blog. It told him what he had already knew.
They were still suffering from their illness. They had placed the following message using their new Compudyne Computer Key Pad:

“The last four days have been some of the strangest ever for this Zwick Family.It all started with a call from a realtor on Thursday morning wanting to show our house on Saturday at 2pm. This in-and-of-itself isn't all that strange, although it does tend to send our household into an extended, unusual frenzy. For two-and-a-half days we dropped everything else we had planned and went to plan B: shooing away large dust bunnies, stuffing closets with things that wouldn't normally go into closets, making fourteen dogs disappear, etc.But the surreal part of the past four days is that most of the members of our family of nine have been hit hard with the most unpleasant bug I think we have ever had in our home. (Certainly according to Lydia, this is the worst sickness she has EVER had!) It has driven our usual energetic, hard-working children straight to bed . . . for days. Each child has been hit with varying degrees of discomforts and tiredness, but for the most part, it has really wiped everyone out. It is as if our little world here in our neck-of-the-woods has stopped for a time!And the house has been eerily quiet.

Melvin sent them a quick note describing his condition. In it he commented how strange it was to have the illness occurred simultaneously between them. Without giving it much though he mentioned the feeling of a splinter in his index finger.
Then it was off for more work. Later in the day Melvin thought of his family again and found they had answered his thoughts.

"It is strange that we all have the same illness at the same time. The illness is contagious so we can understand why we all have it but it is weird that you should have it at the same time. Maybe the cold virus has traveled over the wireless network just like a computer virus. LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Our symptoms are the same as yours. A blocked nose, headache and a hacking cough. It is strange that we have noticed that our computer finger also feels like there is a splinter in it. Strange very strange!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.
Love"

Melvin didn’t give the finger thing much though. The blocked nose and the headache made it difficult to concentrate. In fact Melvin had a difficult time getting a lunch. It seemed that his thought process was somewhat confused and the poor Electrical Kitchen was having a difficult time getting the correct things for his sandwich.

Later in the day Melvin’s brain seemed to clear up a bit. He found it easier to maintain a thought process. He started thinking about what his family had jokingly said about a cold virus being sent over the Wireless Network just like a computer virus.

He though it was a rather stupid thought but it would not leave him. What the heck. Why not contact Compudyne and ask them if they had heard of such an outlandish thing as a cold virus being sent over the Wireless Network.

Melvin slipped on his “Compudyne Computer Key Pad and thought of Compudyne and the virus question. He immediately made contact with Compudyne and moved to their, “Contact us” page. The computer would not accept a question about cold viruses. Melvin would type in, “Are any of your customers complaining about a terrible cold virus?” Just as Melvin was ready to send the message it would disappear from the Holograph Screen. It was almost as if the Computer did not want to send a message about a cold virus to Compudyne.

Melvin decided to take another tact. He went into the back room where his old computer was. It was the old style with a regular keyboard and computer screen. He dusted it off and fired it up. Melvin wondered how people accepted the slowness of this old workhorse when compared to the new Compudyne Computer Key Pad.

Melvin’s attempt to contact Compudyne was handled without incident. It was a little difficult remembering how to type. He went to their “contact us” page and wrote them the following:

“This is a dumb question but I feel obliged to ask. Are any of your customers experiencing a terrible cold?”

Several times during the day he put on his Compudyne Computer Key Pad and searched for an answer from Compudyne. None existed. On a lark Melvin went back to the old workhorse computer and looked for a response from Compudyne. And there it was.

“We are investigating why many of our Compudyne Computer Key Pad customers are experienced a sever cold. It seem everyone using our Key Pad have blocked noses, sever head ache and a hacking cough. All are complaining about the feeling of a splinter in their index finger. We have found that the Key Pad has developed a wire that is sticking up into the finger area of the key pad. We have not been able to prove it yet but we suspect that the Compudyne Computer has caused the Key Pad to grow the wire that is sticking our customers in the finger and passing on the cold virus. It is recommended that you no longer use our Computer Key Pad until we can solve the possible problem.
To add to our suspicions our Computer Key Pad would not send out a message about a cold virus. Every time we wrote a message about a cold virus our computer screen would go blank. We had to go back to our old computer system to get this message out to our Compudyne Computer Key Pad System.
Thanks for you patience. Compudyne”

How scary is that? Ever since computers could talk to each other they have been capable of passing on viruses to each other. And now we find that computers might be capable of passing on cold viruses to their human operators. Was the Compudyne Computer Key Pad smart enough to protect itself and not pass on the question of a possible cold virus being passed on by itself? The thought is a chilling one.
And so its back to the old key board and computer system which we will have to use until Compudyne determines how to give their Computer Key Pad an inoculation to wipe out its cold virus.
Within days Melvin and his family were back to their old selves.

These Are a Few of My Favorite Things . . .

The Bowes kids always find things to challenge MELVIN ZWICK. This is the challenge:

This week's assignment is titled "Happy Lists". All we needed to do was think about all the things that make us happy in life. But the creative twist is to plug these favorite/happy things into an acrostic of our names.


M-Momma Bowes whose chocolate loving is second only to MELVIN ZWICK
E-Every word Grandpa’s Grandkids write
L-Lots of all color M and Ms
V-Valerie and Victoria
I-Imothy What the heck I, MELVIN ZWICK, do not have a “T” in my name
N-Never running out of stories for MELVN ZWICK to tell


A-And Computer expert Pappa
L-Lydia
W-Whole bunches of Chocolate covered Strawberries.
A-All of Grandpa’s daughters and Grandkids
Y-Yummy Green corn tamale, Baja style
S-Slushy root bear floats so thick you have to eat with a spoon


G-Goseph, What the keck I, MELVIN ZWICK, do not have a “J” in my name
O-Oodles of chocolate with almonds
O-Oodles of praline and cream ice cream
F-Furry kitties
E-ESCAPE Crew, Every Sheep Can Always Plan Escapes
Y-Yummy German Chocolate cake


Z- Zeal of Grandpa’s family
W-White and Black kitties
I-Ice cold Crystal Lite drink in the summer time
C-Caroline
K-Kyle

TIMOTHY'S CATCH

Hey Robyn, There is a great fire engine site where you can click on various sections of a fire engine to see what is behind the door.


http://www.city.davis.ca.us/Fire/tour/

Love You all big Bunches
Grandpa

THE RUN AWAY CROSSROADS ANIMALS

THE NIGHT THE GOATS SNUCK OUT OF
Crossroads Country Ranch
By
MELVIN ZWICK

The two deputy sheriffs of the Bowes Crossroads Country Ranch. There is no chance that sheep or goat rustlers will ever get any of the stock as long as these two tough ladies are on guard. Both of these ladies can pop the eyes off a fly at 100 feet.

But I digress. This story is about the time the Crossroads, Country Ranch Goats pulled the wool over Angels the llama’s eyes and spent the night frolicking. It is well known that Angel thinks she is the mother to the goats and sheep. She herds the animals, whether they want to go or not, into the animal shelter at night for protection.

GOLIATH

HEIDI

One day recently Goliath and Heidi the Crossroads Country Ranch goats were up to their usual frolicking on the cable spools the Ranch hands provided them.

Goliath said, “You know it would be fun to be able to eat and frolic all night long but Angel won’t let us.” Heidi replied, “That sure is the truth. You would think Angel is our Mother.” The Ranch goats continued to climb on the spools.

Goliath said, “You know that weird human they call Melvin Zwick helped get these cable spools for us to frolic on. I bet he loves to frolic all night long. I am going to talk to him. Maybe in his weird way he might be able to help us be free of Angle, at least for a night.”

Goliath put his mind to work and thought about Melvin Zwick. Before long Melvin Zwick answered him. The two of them came up with a scheme to allow Goliath and Heidi to escape Angel so they could frolic and eat grass all night long.

What follows is the story, written by me MELVIN ZWICK, as told to me by the Crossroads Country Ranch animals, Goliath, Heidi, Shirley, Justice and other miscellaneous Crossroads friends.

You may not recognize us in our disguises. I am Goliath and the little one is Heidi. We have decided to wear these disguises just in case Angel sees us as we attempt to escape.

The crazy llama Angle never lets us out at night so tonight we will sneak out in our disguises and have a ball running free in the new pasture eating all the grass we want. Maybe Angel will never miss us. I don’t think she knows how to count.

Just look at her. She thinks she is our mother.

Hey guys, will you take me with you? Being the black sheep of the white flock sort of makes me an outsider especially when you consider that my Papa was an American Blackbelly sheep. I mean, who would like to be called a Blackbelly sheep. What an insult for a lady. But you must admit I am sort of cute.

Shirley, we will be glad to take you along. But first we must find a disguise.

Now that will do it. Angel will never recognize you is she sees you from a distance. The disguise is not threatening so she will not try to run you off.

Hey I heard what you said. I, Joy, don’t think you will get away with your plan to sneak out. But it sounds like fun. I will help you by distracting Angel when you are ready to go. I will make a break for open pasture tonight. You guys make a break for it when Angel takes off after me.

But you will owe me. You have to leave me some special delicious tender grass for me to eat.

Goliath do you promise to save me that grass.

Yes Joy. I will see that a nice patch of tender grass is save just for you.
Now I, Goliath, have a question for you all. Do you guys remember that goofy guy they call Melvin Zwick? He is just the kind of trouble maker that loves to create problems for everyone.

Well I contacted him and had him send some photos to help us in our plan. This picture was taken several years ago by Melvin Zwick. Do you wonder why I, Goliath, show you a picture of Timothy, the little fellow that chases us all the time? Its not the picture of him that is interesting, its what’s behind him.

You probably notice that it is of Timothy standing in the front of our masters house. What’s important about this picture is that it shows the pasture West of our house. Note how high the grass is. If I, Goliath, Shirley and Heidi get on the other side of that grass no one will see us.

You all know that our masters just built a gate so we can get into the new pasture from our pasture. That excellent idea was created by Lydia and Valerie. Lydia called the owner and asked permission from him to allow the Crossroads Ranch to move their animals onto his property. He thought it was a great idea in that he would no longer have to mow his grass. Valerie called him and asked permission to build a gate in their common fence to allow easier transfer of the animals on to this pasture. He gave Valerie that permission.

Here is a map Melvin Zwick gave me. I, GOLIATH, marked it up to show some of the points of interest. The green line shows the route Joy must run. The red line shows the route I, Goliath, Heidi and Shirely have to run to escape from Angel.

If you look closely at the two pastures you can see why Lydia wanted to open the new pasture to us. You can see that there is a lot more grass on the new pasture that there is on the old pasture.

I, GOLIATH, asked Justice to join us in our plan. He is the elder statesman of the flock and is not interested in escaping with us but has agreed to help us.
Here is the plan:

Late tomorrow, when no one is looking, Justice will walk up to the gate and do his sneaky thing he is noted for. He will unlock the gate. He will do his thing late enough in the evening so that no one will notice the unlocked gate. He will walk away from the gate. If anyone of our masters heads towards the gate Justice will paw at them playing like he wants attention. No one will suspect that he is trying to hide anything because he is always pawing at someone for attention.

As usual Angel will herd us all into the animal shelter. That’s when Joy will make a break for it. Joy you have to run as fast as you can towards the north east corner of our pasture away from the new gate. When Joy draws Angel to the far corner of the pasture I, GOLIATH, Shirley and Heidi will make a break for the gate. Heidi you must close the gate as soon as we are through it. We will head as far West as we can. No one will see us there and we can spend the whole night frolicking and eating all the grass we want to. Boy what fun that will be.

Angle will be frantic once she finds me, GOLIATH, Shirley and Heidi missing. She will check the whole pasture. She will look at the new gate but will find it locked and assume no one went through it.

She will become worried about all the rest of you and give up looking for us.
First thing the next morning Justice will unlock the gate. Joy will make another run to the North East corner of our pasture which will draw Angel away from the animal shelter. Then I, Goliath, Shirley and Heidi will sneak back to the animal shelter. When Angel and Joy come back she will find us there and become confused. We will tell her that we were in the shelter all night. I, Goliath, hopes she will not notice our fat bellies.

Our great adventure has to take place tonight. If we wait too long all those new puppies will grow up. Once they are grown up the Bowes ranchers might turn them loose to look for us. It will be pretty difficult hiding from Angel but hiding from 10 energetic puppies would be impossible.

I, GOLIATH, don’t trust Baby Blue. He looks like he is ready to chase us now.

Just look at Onry Orange. She looks like she could join Baby Blue. We would not stand a chance of hiding all night if they were turned loose on a hunt for us.

So tonight before they grow up we go. Any questions?

And so it came to pass. Justice did his sneaky thing and unlocked the gate. Joy made a break for it and Angel chased her to the far corner of the pasture. Goliath, Shirley and Heidi rush through the new gate into the new pasture. Heidi did her thing and locked the new gate behind them as they passed through it.

Angel herded Joy back to the animal shelter then realized Goliath, Shirley and Heidi were missing. She went ballistic. Where could they be? She searched the whole pasture. She noted that the gate to the new pasture was closed. The runaways were having a ball in the new pasture and poor Angel was having a fit.

She finally realized she needed to protect the rest of the flock so she settled down in front of the animal shelter.

As is usual when you do something sneaky you can get into trouble. And so it was for the run away animals Goliath, Heidi and Shirley.

Later in the night Charlie, the local sneaky coyote, noted that the there were some animals in the new pasture and Angle his arch enemy was not anywhere near. So he started his slinky approach at the animals. The animals looked somewhat familiar but the was something strange about them. He figured sheep was about the size of a dinner he could handle so he set his sights on her. But he was still somewhat confused. That black sheep looked something like a duck. But old Charlie decided a sheep or a duck made no difference to him. Either way that funny looking critter would make a great dinner.

Lucky for the animals there is not much cover in the new pasture.
Goliath spotted Charlie and gave the alert. All of a sudden frolicking and eating grass became a danger. Goliath, Shirley and Heidi headed for the gate with Charlie close on their heels. The screams of Goliath alerted Angle. She realized the missing flock was in the new pasture behind a locked gate. What to do. She woke up Justice and they rushed to the gate. Justice did his thing and unlocked the gate just as Goliath, Shirley and Heidi reached it. Charlie saw Angel who was raging by now. He decided that going hungry might be better than contending with the flashing hooves of a riled up Angel so he hightailed it back into the new pasture.

Once Charlie was gone and things settled down Angel gave a good tongue lashing to Goliath, Shirley and Heidi. It will be a long time before any of the Crossroads Country Ranch Flock tries to run away. They know now Angle is the protector and they will not leave her too far behind.

THE END

PAYMENT FOR THE ZWICKLAND AIRPORT

ZWICKLAND AIRPORT UPDATE
By
MELVIN ZWICK

The Bowes Seven Arrow Construction Company has fulfilled their Construction Contract requiring them to build an Airport terminal for the Island of ZWICKLAND.

The Terminal Building is shown below. It will be installed on the island of ZWICKLAND.

Airport Terminal installed on the Island of ZWICKLAND.

The Government of ZWICKLAND will fill its financial commitment to the Bowes Seven Arrow Construction Company by sending them 9 million ZWICKLAND dollars.

It should be noted that the only financial institute that will accept ZWICKLAND dollars is the Bank Of Grandpa. The Bank of Grandpa will redeem the ZWICKLAND Dollars with Hugs and Kisses.

The ZWICKLAND Dollars may be redeemed in Phoenix, Arizona where the Bank of Grandpa has it main branch.

In case the Bowes Seven Arrows Construction Company can not travel to Phoenix to redeem the ZWICKLAND Dollars they can wait until the next visit to Mossyrock by the President of the Bank Of Grandpa at which time they can redeem their payment from the Island of ZWICKLAND.