Chương 52: Book 3 - Chapter 2 B

Our family has been having group meals together since moving into the hotel. We meet practically every morning for breakfast and every night for dinner in the communal family dining and entertainment area. The shared meals in the open space just beyond the elevator lobby a comforting constant. Matt had joined immediately, an instant new member of the family. Jennifer didn't join as often, though she had one of the other two bedroom apartments on the family floor, and she was welcome.

She was working out of a small office Grandpa had loaned her in his space on level fourteen. At least until the work level was more than she could handle herself. Everyone happened to be there that morning, enjoying the small breakfast buffet provided by the hotel most mornings. The fully operational hotel having created a larger version downstairs for guests. I had just filled my breakfast plate when the phone rang.

Everyone looked around for a moment wondering who would call us there instead of the office numbers. Grandpa went to answer the phone.

"This is Joe," he said. His eyes got big, and he looked at me.

"It's for you John." I took the phone from his hand, noticing the excitement in his eyes.

"Hello this is John Cook. How may I help you."

"Please hold for the President of the United States," said a voice. I put my hand on the receiver.

"It's the President!" I announced to confused looks.

"Congratulations, Dr Cook. My National Science Advisor recommended I give you a call. I'm glad to tell you how proud and astounded we are by your accomplishments. You've even made the news while I'm here in Germany. I'd very much like for you to come for a visit at the White House after I get back. I'll have my office contact you to make arrangements."

"Thank you, Mr President. Thank you very much. I'm so honored by the invitation and am looking forward to it. I want to say that I appreciate what you did in Germany yesterday. If we can't have peace with Germany after forty years we never will. I know people accuse you of saber-rattling, but I realize you're just reminding the world of the consequences of not seriously seeking peace first."

"Thank you son, I feel much the same way. Perhaps young voices like yours and Samantha Smith's can help guide the world toward a lasting peace."

"I would love to meet her, sir. Do you think we could both come visit you?" I asked.

"I don't see why not, it's nice to have young people come visit the White House. I'll have my staff get with you."

"Again, thank you for calling me Mr President. I'm looking forward to meeting you and the First Lady." The line clicked and a capable young man with a crisp and efficient tone answered the phone. I wrote down the contact number he gave me on the pad next to the wall. I answered several questions about the size of my family. I mentioned I had a personal assistant and lawyer so he wanted their information too. I turned to the everyone who stopped whispering to each other as I hung up, "Guess what?

We've been invited to the White House!" A flurry of questions erupted immediately.

"What do you mean, the White House?"

"Who's inviting us?" I held up a hand, repeating the conversation to quell the rising excitement.

"This is very exciting, John, but I need to get Mattie ready for school," Mom said.

"Aw Mom!" she cried.

"I only have a week left. Do I have to go?"

"Don't you want to tell your friends Johnny got a call from the President?" she told her, as she pulled her out of the room.

"I don't have much information. They'll call back when we have a date. That was just the President making the invitation. I wrote the phone number on the note pad on the wall," I said, and sat to eat. The conversation remained lively, but most others finished eating before I did, as I had gotten to breakfast late. When I was done, I tapped Grandpa on the shoulder to get his attention as he finished another cup of coffee before work.

"Grandpa can you join Matt and I today? We need to leave at nine," I said and walked away before he could answer, or ask about the plans. Matt and I checked the three experimental production machines upstairs. Then I spent some time writing letters. At 9am I met Matt and Grandpa who were waiting for me in the basement garage. Matt checked out one of the hotel shuttle vans and we took off heading southeast towards Broken Arrow.

"What adventure are we going on this time, John?" Grandpa asked, more nervous than curious, having experienced a surprise trip before.

"We are headed to check on the progress of the tile printing machine that the engineer I hired has been working on."

"Oh! That's great," he said in relief.

"Is it finished?" Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

"That's what we are going to check on," I told him. We eventually got to the house. It was an older area that had homes with actual property, some had horses, others big barns. So much of this area was on its way to being indistinguishable cookie-cutter houses on postage stamp lots with the only green space provided by manicured golf courses. Every section and subdivision in big squares, neat and straight. I was not a fan of this planned uniformity, but I understood the economic reality of suburban growth.

Matt had been here before with me, so he knew the way. He pulled up to a big steel shop building and we got out. Nobody seemed to be around, so I told Matt, "Give the horn a honk." When he did the sliding door on the very large building slid open. I walked up and greeted the guy who came out.

"Ted, how are you? How's the project?" I asked.

"It's working great, glad you came to check it out." I introduced Ted to Grandpa. Then Ted, visibly excited as the machine ran on its own in the middle of the shop, started explaining how it worked.

"John hired me to build the tile printer for him. Together we worked out the design and he wrote the software while I built the hardware. It runs on an IBM PC.

"John's Magic Eye software saves the finished artwork. The machine takes the saved file and uses a series of precision motors to lay out colored tiles onto a mesh sheet. It puts all the colored tiles in exactly the right space. When it finsihes printing, I move the sheet of tiles to the side. I've got the mermaid picture on the floor right now if you want to see."

"What's Magic Eye?" Grandpa asked.

"Marketing. Autostereogram was too much of a mouthful. We will do color posters, prints and a couple coffee table books for the hotel. Mr Benz insisted on it, and my publisher thinks it will be very popular," I explained.

"Mr Benz? My hotel architect?" Grandpa asked.

"Yeah, the book will advertise the hotel and his restoration work."

"Wow, she's not wearing much," Matt said, interrupting us as his eyes focused on the mural laying out on the concrete floor. Ted blushed a little, that one had been left out on the floor for a reason.

"That looks great," Grandpa said.

"I love how the green tiles seem to be seaweed growing behind her. How much of the pool mural is finished?"

"I'll be done with the four walls around the pool at the end of the week," Ted told him.

"I thought that it would be 1 inch tiles," Grandpa said.

"It made the hidden images too large. By reducing the tile size by half, I'm actually quadrupling the resolution. The smaller tiles work better for the hidden images," I explained.

"We can only do two-foot wide strips at a time, but the length is limited only by the size of the mesh sheet. That comes on a fifty-foot roll."

"So this machine will work for more than just Magic Eye pictures, right?" Grandpa asked, a speculative tone in his voice.

"Yes, any design, any size, with sixteen colors maximum on this machine. We can do patterns, words, pictures, artwork, photographs—the list goes on and on as the software allows for incredible flexibility," I told him.

"This is fantastic," Grandpa said.

"It's so much more durable than any other artwork for a building. Have you tested how easy it is to install?"

"Yes, our contractor had a smaller job where the owner wanted a herringbone pattern in his bathroom, using very small tiles and University of Tulsa colors. We printed that out and he was able to install it in just a couple of hours. He loved it, the owner loved it, it worked so well that he wants to buy one of these for himself."

"Really!" exclaimed Ted, "How much?"

"I told him it was fifty-five thousand for the machine, including service and repairs for a year. So as soon as you're at a point where this is under control, I need you to start building a second one," I instructed Ted. Ted whooped loudly and danced across the room. Grandpa looked at me for an explanation.

"Ted gets half of our sales, minus cost of materials. It's about twenty grand to split. It's part of our deal, I pay for materials and an hourly wage for him to build and run this machine. He also provides space and electricity for the work."

"Ted's not going to be able to keep up with orders once the pictures of the hotel get spread around," Grandpa noted.

"You're right, I'll hire him as Chief Engineer when it's time to start a production company."

"When is the contractor coming to pick up the tile work?" I asked the still excited Ted.

"Tomorrow sometime. I've got them all labeled and another copy of the placement map in case he's lost his again."

"You remembered to mark which end was up as well as labeling them all?"

"Yes. You can see them right there," he said, pointing to the rolls of tile laid out along one wall.

"How heavy are those?" Matt asked.

"It takes two guys to lift them," Ted answered. I thanked Ted and climbed back into the van to return to the hotel.

"How small of a tile can the machine print?" Grandpa wanted to know.

"Right now, it's a quarter-inch tile. Anything smaller than that and it becomes difficult to load the machine."

"Will it be done in time for the grand reopening?" Grandpa asked.

"The pool and eight floors will be fully complete before June 1st."

"Which won't be ready yet?"

"Eight through sixteen. We're skipping the family level to get the rooftop bar finished."

"That's fine, those are mostly the units for leasing," he said.

"I want to do something special for the celebration," I said, a big smile on my face.

"I'm scared to ask, but what are you thinking?"

"Since the city denied your fireworks permit, I want to do a fire tornado on the roof."

"What is that?" Grandpa asked, his expression a fascinating blend of horror and intrigue.

"Just as it sounds, a tornado made of fire. The tornado is held in place by the machine that spins to make it. It's very impressive, but quite safe if handled carefully. It's just a propane burner and some wind. We will have a small one outside on the street so people will know what it is. Otherwise they will think the hotel is on fire."

"That seems pretty crazy," he told me, with a big grin matching mine.

"I agree, way crazy," Matt chimed in.

"So crazy that it will be on every TV news channel in Oklahoma, Kansas, Missouri, Arkansas, and Texas," I told him confidently. That was advertising dollars Grandpa understood.

"Build a little one first so I can see it work. I mean little too, under a foot tall," he insisted. So when we got back to the hotel I went to my lab and built a little one. It was hand powered, with a small handle to pull the cord and turn the spinner. For fire I used an alcohol burner from a mobile hot buffet table. For safety I used a chicken wire cage to enclose it on the sides.