The next morning I felt refreshed and ready to go. What a difference a good night’s sleep made. I went outside and looked around. “Wow! It’s a terrific day,” I said to myself. “Today, there are a couple of things that I’d like to do. I want to take my first ride on an airplane, and I want to see Las Vegas.”

I packed my things, and I left the motel. I drove a few miles east of Denver to D.I.A. I had planned to leave the Corvette at the airport and take the time-travel remote with me to Las Vegas. That way I could program the remote to transfer the car to Las Vegas, and I wouldn’t have to take a plane back to Denver to retrieve the vehicle.

After I got to the airport, I bought a one-way ticket to Vegas. I only had to pay seventy-nine dollars. They gave me a good discount because some lady had just canceled her reservation; they wanted to fill her seat.

I thought that my day was going to get off to a flying start. But I encountered a problem at Concourse “K” when I attempted to get through the metal detector to board the plane. A sign posted above the security archway read “PLACE ALL BAGS AND METAL OBJECTS HERE.”

I did my best to be inconspicuous. After I put my duffel bag, war club, and ax on the passenger-check-through belt, I tried to slip, undetected, through the security area. Suddenly, bright-red flashing lights came on. A deafening alarm sounded. The loud noise startled me, and the alarm drew the attention of dozens of airline passengers, who were in the immediate vicinity.

I should’ve realized that my full suit of armor would trigger the alarm. I was thoroughly embarrassed by the incident. Fortunately, I had the visor down on my helmet; nobody saw the blood rushing to my sweat-dampened, ruby-red face.

To make matters worse, two security guards rushed over and hurriedly carried me away. I trembled from head to toe. My quivering left hand held an airline ticket that had “VIVA LAS VEGAS” and “FUN JET” boldly typed across the front of it. “Some fun this idea turned out to be,” I said.

Then the guards hustled me to the front door. “We suggest that you choose another mode of transportation,” one of the guards said, showing a sneer on his face.

After the security men released me and returned my bag and my weapons to me, outside the main terminal, I raised my war club and said, “You guys wouldn’t be so brave if it wasn’t for the fact that there are two of you and that you both are toting those big black revolvers!”

“I’m only going to tell you this once, pal,” the other guard said, after pulling out his pistol and pointing it at me. “Put down that big club of yours! How would you like to spend the night in jail, Sir . . . whoever you are?” I lowered my weapon and took off on a mad dash for the Vette.

I reached into the car and took out a piece of cardboard and a magic marker. Then I wrote “EXCALIBUR HOTEL & CASINO OR BUST!” in large black letters, and I hung the sign on the passenger-side door of the car. I was determined to get to Vegas one way or the other.

Frustrated and a bit angered after the incident with the metal detector, I said to myself, “I refuse to change clothes just to travel on an airplane! What’s the world coming to that one must undress to fly first class? . . . Lord, how can I overcome my resistance to change?”

When I started to get into the car, I heard somebody coming up from behind me. I grabbed my ax and swiftly spun around; I was ready to strike out against any potential adversary. I probably shouldn’t have been so hasty.

“Oh—God! It’s just You!”

“Wantsalittle, you could act as though you’re a little happier to see Me.”

“I’m sorry, Lord. My mind is focused on something else right now.”

The Lord asked, “Do you remember what I told you about your being aggressive?”

I was red-faced, again. “Yes, I apologize for threatening the security guards a few moments ago. I get a little hot tempered and hostile at times, as You already know.”

“You called My name and had a question with regards to how you might ‘overcome your resistance to change.’ Let’s see if I can help you with that, okay?”

“Yes! Obviously, I’m pretty set in my ways. I got hung up with the metal detector, here at D.I.A., as I tried to board a plane to Las Vegas. I’m not accustomed to all of modern technology and to various contemporary cultural standards and ways. In many respects, my life was much simpler and easier in Camelot. How can I learn to be more flexible and willing to accept positive change?”

God said, “Let’s sit down in the car and discuss this topic for a few minutes.”

With my cumbersome suit of armor, it took me a minute to wedge my way into the Vette. The Lord sat down in the passenger-side seat. Again, She was very alluring. On this occasion, God fashioned a white, satin, short-sleeve blouse, a dark-red, pleated skirt, and low-heel, white sandals. But this time, Her shirt was buttoned clear to the top!

As soon as we both got comfortable, the Lord said, “Walter Bagelot once wrote, ‘One of the greatest pains to human nature is the pain of a new idea.’ Really, Wantsalittle, change is good when people have positive images and ideas that lead to progress. Some change, an improved airport security system, for example, is necessary if it serves to benefit or to better protect the rights and privileges of the public at large.”

The late-morning sun shined brightly through the cloudless sky. Outside the car, the temperature was about ninety degrees. We put the windows down as soon as we got into the Vette, but it was still getting too warm in the car. The Lord exclaimed, “God, it’s getting hot in here!” She quickly unfastened the top three buttons on her sweat-dampened blouse and squirmed around, from side to side, on the car seat for a few seconds. These maneuvers allowed me a glimpse of Her high-riding cleavage, which was enticingly presented to me from over the top of Her light-red, low-cut, French-lace, push-up bra.

I had a feeling that God was going to be long-winded with Her suggestions. She probably would have to take several deep breaths of air throughout Her upcoming food-for-thought message. Although I really hated to, under the fantastic peeking conditions, I started the engine, put the windows up, and turned on the air-conditioner. Then I flipped the switch on the blower to full blast.

“I want you to read part of a good story,” God said, “of two men who overcame a greater resistance to positive change.”

The Lord handed me a sheet of paper. A section of a movie script was typed on the page. “What I’m about to share with you is an excerpt from a scene in a popular American film, The Outlaw Josey Wales. Clint Eastwood played Josey Wales, and the late Clint Sampson had the part of Ten Bears, a wise but angry Comanche Indian Chief.”

“Great! But how did You know what question I wanted to ask? Do You make it a habit to carry portions of movie scripts around with You?”

“Wantsalittle, give Me a little credit, will you? As your God, I have a clairvoyant mind. I can see into the future. I knew, beforehand, what you were going to ask Me.”

By now, the temperature in the car had dropped to a cozy seventy degrees. While re-buttoning her blouse, God said, “Wantsalittle, I hope that you’ve enjoyed ‘the view’ for the past minute or so. You seem to have a constant fixation with My chest!”

“Yeah, but it seems to me that You have a tendency to expose a plentiful portion of Your fine, full, mammary glands. I don’t know whether or not that You’re being generous or simply teasing me or what?”

The Lord chuckled and said, “Well, I admit that I am teasing you a little. I just thought that My sexy, more-revealing attire might help to keep our meetings and conversations on the lighter side and make our important, meaningful conferences a little more fun for you. Honestly, My breasts are not that big. My push-up bra gives you a false impression of My actual bust size. Tell me something, Wantsalittle. Could you ever become interested in a woman who wasn’t well endowed?”

“Sure! Marilotta Light isn’t that ‘big,’ as You must already know. But I haven’t been able to get her off my mind. In fact, I’d seriously consider falling in love and marrying Marilotta, or somebody very much like her. For many guys, bigger boobs just give a female a little extra physical appeal. But that part or any other specific part of a woman’s anatomy, is not all that important to me. A lady is beautiful by what is in her heart, and that is what counts in any meaningful relationship!”

“I’d like to believe all of what you just said, Wantsalittle. Really, though, I don’t know if there is any hope for you with respect to young, attractive, buxom women. Perhaps, time will tell!” We both chuckled. Then God said, “Now, Sir Wantsalittle Morefromlife, please take the time to read the brief excerpt from the movie script.”

The script read:

Josey Wales: You’ll be Ten Bears?

Ten Bears: I am Ten Bears.

Josey Wales: I’m Josey Wales. . . . I came here to die with ya or to live with ya. Dying ain’t so hard for men like you and me. It’s living that’s hard. Governments don’t live together; people live together. With governments, you don’t always get a fair word or a fair fight. Well, I’ve come here to give ya either one or get either one from ya. . . . The sign of the Comanche—that will be on our lodge; that’s my word of life.

Ten Bears: And your word of death?

Josey Wales: It’s here in my pistols, there in your rifles. I’m just giving you life, and you’re giving me life. . . . And I’m saying that men can live together without butchering one another.

Ten Bears: There’s iron in your words of death for all Comanche to see, and so there’s iron in your words of life. No signed paper can hold the iron. It must come from men. The words of Ten Bears carries the same iron of life and death. It is good that warriors such as we meet in the struggle of life or death. . . . It shall be LIFE!

When I handed the script back to God, She said, “This is a classic example of two great men, each representing different cultures, who found a way to accept new circumstances and benefit from their changing environments.”

The Lord stopped to take a deep breath. I turned the air conditioner down a couple of notches, hoping that She might get a little overheated, again, during Her rather exhausting dissertation. Then God continued, “Ben Franklin hit it right on the mark when he stated, ‘We must all hang together or assuredly we will all hang separately.’”

“Yeah, but how does the Josey Wales’ and Ten Bears’ story pertain to me?”

The Lord paused to take an even deeper breath. Unfortunately, She left Her blouse fully buttoned. Then God concluded, “It’s high time that civilized societies, governments, and all of mankind overcome their resistance to positive change. People must begin to respect, tolerate, and love one another, individually and collectively, and lay down their arms and prejudices! Wantsalittle, are you on the same page with Me here?”

I tried to quickly respond to the Lord’s question. But my mouth was wide open at the time; I was right in the middle of the last one of four, back-to-back, big YAWNS! As soon as I was able to get my mouth closed, I replied, “Yes! And I’ll try to do my part!”

“Wantsalittle, I’m glad to hear that. . . . Say, you look like you’re about to fall asleep. I hope that you’re not getting bored with My important message! Are you?”

“Oh, no!” I exclaimed, my eyes now wide open and my jaws now clamped shut, following my yawns.

“Wantsalittle, when we first met, you confessed that you had overly aggressive tendencies. Something tells Me that you’re in for a tough battle with that particular personal demon.”

“Yes, but with Your help, I think that I can overcome my bad temper and aggressive ways. God, is there anything else that You’d like to add on the topic of ‘accepting positive change’?”

“Here is one last thing: I want you to remember that as you think with the attitude of accepting positive change, you will become a part of progress, accordingly. Try to think about how you’ll overcome your resistance to positive change.”

Again, the Lord left just as suddenly as She had appeared. In a way, I was kind of glad to see Her leave, for now. I said to myself, “What a sermon! When the Lord gets going, you can’t shut Her up! I think that She must’ve got up on the wrong side of the bed this morning. Why is She taking Her problems with some of the rest of the world out on me? Besides, the Lord could’ve summed up much of what She had to say in one figurative sentence: As most people on earth constantly try to screw one another, some mutants will be born! Anyway, I sure hope that God is in a better mood the next time that I call on Her!”

The time had come for me to go on with my plans for the day. I typed in the words “Las Vegas” on the time-travel module and pushed the green ‘Go’ button. I didn’t expect what happened next.

On my way to “Glitter Gulch,” that outlaw, Josey Wales, held me up! Here’s how I ended up playing “Cowboys and Indians”:

The Vette and I energized out in the middle of nowhere. I was surrounded by lots of cactus, a few rocks, and some shrubs. And I saw some wildlife. A prairie rattler slithered across the trail in front of the car. I noticed a couple of lizards. They were slithering around in the desert sand. Then I looked up and gazed at a vulture, which was hovering just above me. The rapacious bird fluttered his wings when he looked down on me; the vulture probably hoped that I would end up being his next prey. Also, I saw several scorpions. The ugly little critters were crawling all over the ground, snacking on ants.

I said to myself, “What happened here? I know that Las Vegas is out in the desert, but something isn’t right!”

I looked down at the computer module. The dial read “Las Vegas, New Mexico; July 28, 1867; 3:30 P.M.” Then I began to understand. I forgot to program the time-travel computer for “Nevada,” and I forgot to put in the “date and time” of day. Some wires in the time-travel unit must’ve crossed. I was transported to the future site of Las Vegas, NEW MEXICO. I said, “No problem! I’ll just re-enter the date, place, and time.”

Before I entered the correct data on the computer module, I got out of the car to stretch my legs for a minute and to have a cigarette. I had asked Willie if I could have the rest of his carton of Tomarlbury cigarettes to take with me on my journey. I sort of got into the bad habit of smoking Tomarlburys when I was staying in Hollywood.

As I took a drag on my just-lit cigarette, I noticed that I wasn’t the only one in the vicinity who was blowing smoke. I looked off into the distance and saw smoke signals coming up from behind a hill, about a mile away. Those little clouds of white and gray smoke made me curious. But there was just a wagon trail headed in that direction. I knew that the Vette didn’t have enough clearance to get over the rocks and ruts in the road. I didn’t know how to set the computer to travel that mile, so I came up with a better idea.

Willie had told me, that with the main computer module in the car, it was possible to transport somebody or something, through time, either TO some destination, as would normally be the case, or FROM some place in time, in the event that I would want to fetch Spirit, my talking horse, for instance. I could only do this if I knew somebody’s exact location at a particular time. Then I could energize those molecules to wherever I happened to be.

I knew that Spirit always rested in the same spot in his stall every night. And because of the time difference between New Mexico and England, I also knew that it would be late at night in Camelot. I said, “What have I got to lose?” I keyed in what I hoped were all the appropriate buttons on the module and pressed Go.

As fast as my stallion could have wagged his tail or as if Merlin were performing his sorcery magic—presto—Spirit suddenly appeared. The horse energized right between the car and me.

“Hi there, Spirit!” I said. I walked over and stroked the palomino’s long, light-brown and golden-colored snout. “Welcome to the ‘Badlands’ of New Mexico. Would you like to take me for a little ride?”

“Master, it’s good to see you again! I’ve been wondering about you. Hop aboard. I’ll take you wherever it is that you want to go.”

I mounted up and headed on down the trail. I got about a hundred yards from the car and just around the first bend in the road. All at once, some cowpoke galloped out from behind a clump of tall sage brush. He hollered, “Halt there, partner! Where da ya think yer goin’? . . . And why are ya dressed from head ta foot with all that strange-lookin’ tin?”

My “strange-lookin’ tin” outfit shouldn’t have looked any stranger to him than his dusty old cowboy duds appeared to me! Anyhow, I readied my lance and replied, “My name is Sir Wantsalittle Morefromlife. Please state your intentions before I move to impale you!”

“Hold on there, Sir . . . whoever ya said! I mean ya no harm! Do ya realize that yer right-smack-dab in the middle of Comanche Indian country?”

I said, “Say—I know a little bit about you. Aren’t you some kind of a famous outlaw? Don’t they call you ‘the outlaw Josey Wales’?”

“Yeah, some people refer ta me as ‘the outlaw Josey Wales,’ but I AIN’T NO OUTLAW! I’ve never stole nothin’ in my life, and I’ve never kilt nobody that didn’t need killin’. Some Union soldiers, who are searchin’ for me, tagged me with the term ‘outlaw.’ In truth, it’s they who are the real outlaws!”

Then I turned and said, “Those smoke signals up ahead—let me guess—I’ll bet that the smoke is coming from Ten Bears’ Indian village.”

“How did ya know that?” Josey asked?

“Just call it a lucky guess. Have you already spoken with Ten Bears?”

Josey tucked his pistol back in his holster and got down off his gray stallion. Then he replied, “Nope, I’m on my way ta do that now. You see, Ten Bears is angry. The white man has lied to him, ambushed his warriors, taken away his prime huntin’ grounds, and pushed him as far as he’s willin’ to go. Now he wants to fight back for what’s already rightfully his!”

“Aren’t you afraid to go up against him alone?” I asked.

“Yer damn right I am! What’s more, I ain’t got no personal grudge with him. But he’s holdin’ a couple of honest, decent men hostage. I gotta try ta point that out and reason with him.”

“Yeah, I think that I know what you’re going to say to him. Why don’t you let me go in your place?”

“Well . . . okay, but yer probably headed to yer own funeral! If you fail, ya could make it harder fer me ta deal with him later.”

“I won’t fail! It was good talking with you, Josey.”

“Same here, Wantsalittle. Best of luck to ya with Ten Bears!” Josey said, as he began to ride off in the other direction.

An hour or so later, I galloped right into Ten Bears’ camp. He rode out to meet me, along with about a dozen of his braves. We faced each other on horseback. Ten Bears had streaks of red and black war paint smeared all over his forehead and cheeks. He fashioned a three-feather war bonnet; one long, predominately brown eagle feather stuck up between two other grayish ones. I could tell that Ten Bears was in a foul mood and that our meeting was going to be cast in a serious light. Fortunately, I remembered the words from the movie script. I just “filled in” for Josey Wales.

Near the end of our conversation, a couple of Ten Bears’ scouts rode up. They had seen the Vette and read the cardboard sign, which was still taped to the door.

“This paleface roams across our land in style,” one Comanche scout said to all of the other braves. Then he looked at me and asked, “Where is this place you call Excalibur Hotel & Casino?” I just snickered and switched my attention back to Ten Bears.

After Ten Bears said, “It shall be LIFE!”—we tossed our weapons, his lance and rifle and bow together with my lance and war club and ax, on the ground, except for our hunting knives. Ten Bears patted his pure-white stallion on the rump and rode up beside me, closing the few feet of distance that there had been between us. He sat on his horse, just off to my right. As we sat in our saddles, we faced each other, serious but cordial expressions on our faces. Then I leaned a bit to my left, away from Ten Bears, and spat on a scorpion, which had been sunning itself on a flat rock, off to the left side of Spirit.

We used the sharp-bladed knives to slice the palms of our hands. Ten Bears made a slight cut on his right hand; I removed my right steel glove and cut into the palm of my right hand. Scarlet-red blood trickled from Ten Bears’ hand, and blood oozed from the palm of my right hand. Finally, we reached out to each other and tightly clasped the palms of our freshly sliced hands, becoming “blood brothers” in the process.

Ten Bears concluded, “From now on, we will live together as good neighbors in peace!”

Once more, I leaned over and spat on the scorpion. Then, in agreement with the wise Comanche Chief, I said, “I reckon so!”

(The moral of this episode: Overcome your resistance to positive change!)

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