The half-mile entrance to his place was a concrete two-lane roadway. The headquarters was a beehive of activity as machines moved to and from the fields.

"Alter E," I asked, "why does your world look different from mine?"

He put his arm on my shoulder and said, "Look around my world. All farms are successful here."

I glanced around the entire community without moving from my place. (You can do that in a virtual world, you know).

"Oh, my!" was all I could say.

Farmsteads were neat as a pin. Every available acre planted to thriving crops. New equipment gleamed in the sunlight.

Every farm family generated all its income from the farm. Unlike my world, there was no need to work off the farm, not even for the added benefit of health insurance.

By then, I had to ask Alter E why they were doing so well. He offered this explanation.

"In my world, people are willing to pay a little extra for the food they buy. Food safety and national food security are higher priorities here. Terrorists are a real threat in your world, but they are no threat in ours."

I interrupted, "Your market system is the same as ours, though. Why are your prices so much higher? Price discovery is very efficient when many buyers and sellers come together."

"True," he replied. "Actually, food costs are not much higher than in your world. Bread costs a nickel more. Fruits and vegetables are a little higher, perhaps. The exception is meat. Nobody wants to pay $25 bucks for a steak."

"You got that right," I replied.

Alter E continued, "National food policy in my world was created for the sole purpose of ensuring a safe environment for farmers and consumers alike. Food safety, healthy food choices and freedom from tyrannical forces were the building blocks of our production and marketing policy.

"We know better food nutrition cannot be taken for granted. It takes an investment in time and money to take advantage of genome research. Health benefits come along as the result of this, ultimately giving everyone a chance at a better life."

"The key to our success, however, is simple. Farmers benefit financially from royalties gained from all the nutritional and productive benefits gleaned in the research labs. It's like a value-added tax. After all, their hard work and investment in research and development helped create such good food."

"That's a great idea!" I said. "Farmers work all year to put food on everyone's plate, they should benefit from everybody's good fortune as well."

Once again, my gaze returned to the community Alter E called home. I noticed something strange. All people lived a prosperous life, farmers and non-farmers alike.

"Alter E, one question," I said. "I don't see evidence of poverty in your community. Why is that?"

"Oh, that," he chuckled. "Well, when the legislators changed the national food policy, some lunatic wrote an amendment to the legislation that created a futures exchange market for every non-farm profession. As usual, nobody read the final draft before the president signed it."

"For the first time in the history of my world, anybody could own a thousand doctors or basketball players on paper-with little or no money down-and trade them like bushels of grain. You could be long or short in the market, do straddles on calls and puts, whatever.

"This actually turned out to be a good thing. It drove down the cost of health care and entertainment. All professionals had to compete with professionals from other countries. In addition, if they got too expensive, some trader would threaten to force delivery on a couple thousand contracts, and 'wah-lah,' the market would self correct. The end result was realistically priced services in every sector."

By this time, I knew things were heading toward the weird side. Alter E lived in the fertile land of his own imagination.

Imagine a futures program for every profession and affordable health care. Yeah, right. This was too good to be true.

Equally puzzling was prosperity in every corner. Imagine farmers actually making a real living from the farm. One can only take so much dreaming before it makes you sick.

I bid Alter E farewell. Later, I focused on the Kansas City Board of Trade's (real world) activity for the past 24 hours.

Let's see-current wheat crop conditions are worse than this time last year. Frost concerns are real. Reports of damage vary from zero to 30 percent damage. All news reports are still bearish news even when coupled with dry planting conditions in Australia. Drought is rearing its ugly head in the Midwest once again. In the meantime, traders and speculators are convinced we have adequate supplies on hand.

Where in the world do they live?

Back in my world, if I sell a new crop now and buy a call at the money or sell a put 10 cents out of the money, I might gain a few cents a bushel. Maybe a bull call spread is a better strategy.

It's too late to hedge this year's wheat crop. Milo and beans still hold promise, though.

Pull the trigger on some grain sales! Prices are too low, but I need to be realistic. Capture some profit, now! This is my salary we are playing with here.

Should I go long instead? I should have sold more 2005 crop back in March 2004! Who knew prices would go south when energy costs headed up? Should I hedge fuel and fertilizer for '06 and '07 and contract now for future delivery? I have too many questions and not enough answers.

Weather derivatives are too risky right now. The current export inspections and projected stocks-to-use ratio does not support a sustained upward price projection.

I can forget about getting more money from Farm Service Agency. Urbanites and their politicians don't seem to care where their food comes from. Terrorists are a distant but looming nightmare, dirty bombs notwithstanding.

Are they a real threat to my food security? Who am I talking about? Terrorists are more likely to be the threat than urbanites. For now, that is.

Writing my own paycheck on the farm is more complicated than when my dad worked the land.

If only somebody could figure out a better way for farmers to be paid.