Potatoes and the Sink

This was in the bathroom of the house we stayed at in Blacksburg. Not sure if it is a still life or actually someone was grilling somewhere. Needless to say, I didn't disturb the potatoes.

The World As It Is

Monday morning - I am back at work. Ahh...The veggie car is down, but I will never say it is out. If you read Brian's post below, you know that he is in DC - going back to get the car towed to a mechanic in Harrisburg PA either today or tomorrow. If the mechanic can't fix it, Brian will then transport it to Syracuse at a little expense. Once it is back in Syracuse, he will put in a new transition, maybe swap out the engine for the other one he has at home, and in some ways the car will be back on the road running veggie fuel again soon.

This is an unflattering picture of the car in its current state. We put the hood down, but it is still jammed under the trees like that. When we went back to get our stuff out on Saturday, a campus police car rolled up - Brian had left a note for them, so they knew the car wasn't stolen, and were happy to see that we were dressed like people that would be driving a 1975 Mercedes through Virginia. The cop said we could leave the car there for a couple of days, and they would keep an eye on it to make sure it wasn't messed with. It is in safe hands.

Was it disappointing that the car didn't make it to Syracuse - sure. But more disappointing would be if we didn't make it out of Kansas, or if the veggie oil didn't work at all. Basically, the transition blowing is something totally out of our control. As I explained it to my Mom - it is like we were working on the plumbing of a house for a week and finally got everything working perfectly, and then a tornado came by and tore the roof off. Yes, the car is un-drivable, but it isn't because of the veggie fuel. In fact, now that I have gotten back to NY, and have a little hind site - I think we really did an amazing job of dealing with crazy problems and working through them. Doing anything for the first time is difficult, and Brian and I both learned a whole lot about how to handle the difficulties of harvesting and filtering your own fuel and dealing with the diesel engine. Now, to answer the 2 most asked questions by people when we got back.....

1. DID YOU GUYS SMELL LIKE FRENCH FRIES AND TACOS WHILE DRIVING DOWN THE ROAD?

No, if anything we had a slight odor of chicken wings. Let me put it this way - no bears attacked us when we camped in the woods - you know they would have come out in droves if we were stinking of fried food the whole time!

2. DID PEOPLE LOOK AT YOU LIKE YOU WERE CRAZY WHEN YOU ASKED FOR THEIR OIL?

Um, yes. But this might have been because of our crazy sunglass and Northern accents.

We'll keep posting stuff as the continuing saga of the veggie car - and thanks for everyone's comments and everything. Until next time we go oilin' out, peace in the middle east.

Elliot

Update from Brian:

From Brain:

Elliot made it back to Brooklyn, but I'm still far from home. Car is in Harrisonburg, va - I'm in DC. Wandered around DC this weekend with my friends Damon & Sarah - Went to the National Gallery, Barbecued fantastic food, slept on a comfortable bed (the first in a long while).

I'll be back in Syracuse soon - My uncle is going to let me borrow his old rusted out ford truck - sometime this week I'll be back down in VA - I'll drive down and tow the blown transmission - veggie Benz 5 hours north -back to upstate NY. Even though the car died before the end of the journey, It'll all work out - there's lots of rusted out benz cars sitting in junkyards that I can use to resurrect my car - really wanted to drop in a standard transmission anyways. Moral of the story - be careful what you wish for- shortly before the auto transmission blew I silently wished that the veggie car was a "shifter car" - guess now I get to embark on that project.

Maybe the Moon is to Blame

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Maybe I'm to Blame

Hope everyone enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it. That sound so cliche, but its true. If you are still reading this, then thank you, and I will come clean and say that the oddessy in the veggie car seems to be over. And, of all things, seems to have nothing to do with the veggie fuel. Or so we think. Seems like the transmission just blew - right at the exit in Harrisonberg, VA. So here we are, without a home, like complete unknowns, trying to get back North. Thankfully, all is ok - we met a couple of really cool people that offered to drive us to Blacksburg, where we will spend the night, take a bus to Roanoke, rent a car, drive to the Mercedes, pick up our stuff and head home. Planes , Trains and Automobiles. Man, long trip. But, really, you can look at the negative side of it - or you can say how great it was that the car broke down right near the two cities Brian lived in and near places we could meet great people. That is fortunate. Woah, just kind of hit me how fortunate it really is. See you tomorrow.
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It's Alive!!!

On the road again!! Goodbye Roanoke - car runs great again, Brian is cruising at a health 91Mph, veggiemobile speed. We think that is about 65. This morning we replaced the fuel filter, and tightened up the steering bolts which had come loose. Actually, we heard a weird popping noise when we were at a gas station in Nashville and ever since the steering was a bit funny. Turns out one of the 3 bolts that holds in the power steering system completely broke in half. The other 2 should be good enough to get us home.

The mechanic said that the rings in the engine are worn, which is why it has been hard to start from the beginning. The rings go around the pistons in the engine, and when they are worn they might leak oil, which explains why Brian has gone through 7 quarts of oil since California (engine oil, not the veggie oil). Ironically, the blown rings might have saved the engine from being destroyed when we shot the ether in there! Everything has a reason.

And speaking of that - we just got late lunch at the Co-op in Roanoke - as we were leaving, a heavy set woman came over and started talking to us, being overly friendly. I was thinking, My what a friendly bunch of people there are here. Well, she went on to ask if we knew her friend, Jesus. Brian assured her that he did. I guess he's done this a hundred times since he lived there, smiling told her what she wanted to hear. She blessed him, and then, bless her heart, she blessed the car. So if we don't make it back now I'll know who to talk to. It was very nice and she was rightly impressed that it ran on vegetable oil. Brian told her I'm Jewish, and she told me that Jesus is her favorite Jew. I can't blame her there, she just met me. :)
Whoohoo, heading home!!!
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General Import Service

Roanoke is great. We stayed with Sam's friends Phil and Greg last night. They are great guys - Phil works with foster kids and Greg is a guitarist - so awesome of them to let us stay there for the night. The car is with Micha, a mechanic that specializes in foreign cars. Sound like she can fix it - she thinks maybe one of the injectors is clogged. Brian is changing out the fuel filter also, which we realized hadn't been emptied since he was in Albuquerque, NM. It might be clogged as well which would explain the smoke and the lack of power. It is a hot day here, and I am playing the harmonica and blogging to pass the time.

Also, we had a great ride in the tow truck from Fancy Gap to Roanoke. The driver was an older guy, had live in Fancy Gap his entire life. He was telling us about how small a town Fancy Gap is. "Everybody knows everybody and everything about everybody. When you have sex everybody knows it, they just don't know if its regular or oral."
Nice. Hopefully I'll send pictures of the road back to New York from the Mercedes, but there is still the slight possibility that it will be from a bus window. Suspense....

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Fancy Gap Virginia, or, Last Exit for the Veggie Car?

On our way to the Blue Ridge Parkway, and the car's not sounding good. It is moving, but seems to not have the power to go over about 50 mph (70 on our speedometer). We stop to give it some diesel, and decide we better have a mechanic look at the engine. When there is something wrong that Brian can't figure out, it must be a real problem. But, the serendipity continues- Fancy Gap is 89 miles from Roanoke, VA, where Brian lived and worked last year - he knows the perfect mechanic to bring it to and has AAA-Plus which gives free towing up to 100 miles. On top of that, he knows people that live there, so we call his friend Sam who stayed at my place in Brooklyn a few weeks ago. Sam is still in Brooklyn, but calls a friend of his who says we can crash for the night. Sounds like it was meant to be. I go inside and get fried chicken, Brian calls the tow truck. So long D.C., hello Roanoke...
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Virginia hills

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Pumping from a Steak Place

Had some phone trouble last night, so trying to catch up with the blog now- We found a new batch of fuel yesterday in a small town near Hickory, NC. Which is itself a pretty small town I bet. Anyway, we saw a Mexican place from the highway and we pulled off to see what they had. Their grease dumpster was rancid - the oil was covered with some kind of chunky mold. Yes, I said chunky mold. Nasty. So we drove down the street and checked out a steak place that had gone out of business. It's sign was still up:
"The Steak House Inc.
Home of the Best Steaks
American Owned, American Proud"

Underneath was another cruder sign:
"Coming Soon
The Rock Church
And
Ministries"
Well, we know the church isn't going to need it.
The oil was beautiful. Since it had been sitting untouched for who knows how long all of the sediment had sunk to the bottom and the top was clean oil. Using the new electric pump system, we filled 6 containers and the tank. Probably hounded about 40 gallons. Blessed oil. But man, was it hot. NC heat. Drove up the street and got some local peaches an a tomato which would become our dinner. This blog is a little out of order- this all happened BEFORE the camping and starting fiasco. This is why we had a full tank of veggie oil. Was too easy for our own good. Oh, so instead of taking 12 hours to gather and filter the oil, and instead of making a mess, we got 40 gallons in about 30 minutes and only left a few drops for the ants. Dynomite!!
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Pump in a Bucket

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Big Pumpin'

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The electric pump

This is the electric pump which gives us the power to siphon directly from the grease dumpster into the car. However, with great power comes great responsibility - the tank must be pretty empty by the time we need to turn the car off for the night so that we can put in enough diesel to thin it out. We learned the hard way.
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and into the car

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Out of the bucket, through the filter....

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Tales of Ether and Woods

Finally we are getting on the road today. Sitting at a McAlister's Deli in Mooresville, NC eating the largest baked potato I have ever seen. So good, considering we haven't eaten since 9 PM last night. Car is running, but not without adventure. We excitedly filled it to the brim with oil yesterday after getting the pump working, and expected to drive all the way to Wilmington, NC to stay the night with some of Brian's friends. However, we found that they were not in town, and the long drive just seemed totally ridiculous based on the amount of sleep we got the night before (~none). So we found a beautiful state park, Lake Norman, and set-up camp for the night. We had only run about 2 gallons off the full tank, so we stopped at a gas station to top off the diesel so we could start easily in the morning. Unfortunately, the last gas station we could find didn't have diesel, so we put in a little kerosine and 1 gallon of gasoline. The bigger problem is that there was way too much vegetable oil in the tank. But we weren't thinking all that clearly. Got to the camp site, set up the tent, ate the last of our food (hummos and fresh locally grown tomato sandwich), went swimming, then crashed for the night. I woke up early, went swimming again, relaxing, saw a spider that could have been a black widow it was big enough and looked like one so I watched for a while then went to get the camera and came back and it was gone but it hadn't been heading the direction of the tent so no worries, then Brian got up, we packed up the tent, showered, packed up the car, and tuned on the battery to warm up the injection lines. Half of the lines weren't working. Tested them and there was a short in one. It had been burning itself up for 2 days. We got it straightened out and got it going, and had to let it sit for 30 minutes. As the lines warmed up we conjectured about whether or not the car would start considering the amount of vegetable oil we had in there. Brian, who analyzed the situation with logic, didn't think it had a good chance of starting, and wished he hadn't been so tired the night before and had thought about it. I thought it would start, because I used realism to come up with my reason, which was that it had to start because the vegetable oil car is magical. Brian was right. Damn thing didn't start at all. We spent the next 3 hours insulating the injection lines and trying different things to get it hot enough to get the vegetable oil thin enough to start. No luck. I was walking to go take another swim, and I ran into a maintenance guy. He had some WD-40, so we tried spraying that in the engine as we tried to start it, that didn't work either. He called the main maintenance center, and they sent down a guy with a can of ether. Starting fluid. Made for gasoline engines. Ether is strong stuff. I asked Brian about it, like what would happen if you sprayed ether into a campfire. He said "You know what would happen if you spray gasoline in a campfire? Imagine that x 10". Basically, the stuff is strong - and usually too strong for a diesel engine. But it was our best chance, so we tried it. The maintenance guy sprayed it in while Brian started the car and I watched from the side. You know how it looks on TV when you see someone get defibrillated? THAT is what this was like - like the car coming back from the dead - instantly started coughing and wheezing, but chugging along all the same. It was started. 3PM. 

Whoo - we told the guy we were planning on heading to the coast - called the outer bank - and wondering if we could make it leaving this late. "Yall going there? I don't know you want to do that - it gets pretty hot there in July. And there is no shade anywhere on the whole thing. You get there, and try to camp, and you won't have anywhere to hide from the sun - you'll just be hanging in the car. It's like Iraq out there right now - you could fry an egg on your head!" 

OK, we are heading to D.C.. Pump pictures on the way. No pictures from the campsite - fortunately for us the phone had died and I couldn't take any. :)

The New Filter

This is the lynch pin of the whole operation. No longer do we have to spend hours filling up containers with dirty fuel, spend all night filtering it, and then make a mess funnelling it into the car. This pump system does it all. Pumps the oil out of the grease bin, through a filter, and directly either into the car or into the containers for later use. Wha-la. Booya. Like butter. Like oil. What took us 2 days and a ton of mess in Lawrence took 30 minutes today in North Carolina! Car still running great. We're camping tonight. Phone is not getting much signal - will post more pics tomorrow.
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Smoky Mountains

Border of Tennessee and North Carolina. We did a lot of driving last night - refilled the tank at around 5AM. We now have 2 five-gallon containers left, and have traveled about 900 miles. Had to put in $20 more dollars of diesel last night to suplement the veg-oil in case we stopped for a while and needed to restart in the cold. Both times we usewd diesel we filled up with bio-diesel. Without even looking for them, there are bio-diesel tanks all over the place out here. Last night we filled up with B-20, which means 20% biodiesel and 80% regular diesel. Over the past few years, biodiesel has been a little more expensive than regular diesel, but with the price of oil now so high, biodiesel is a little bit cheaper per gallon now, and burns cleaner of course.
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Nashville

:)
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Refueling...The Aftermath

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Filtertown, Indiana

So, we are still heading towards Nashville. Inching Towards Nashville. Could be a song title. Enjoying beautiful Indiana - we found a place to get a filter for the next time we need to filter the oil. Also exchanged the hand pump and got a small electric pump at Harbor Freight. which should make it a lot easier and cleaner to move the oil around. Also added a rubber gasket to the filter to keep air from leaking in. We had used all our strength to tighten it up the other day, so today when we had to take it apart again to put the gasket in it we were impressed at our strength from the other day. Took us awhile to get it apart. Got some cuts ... But they don't hurt ;)
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Chillin'

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in Illinois

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Thinking of getting fuel pump

Pouring the fuel from the containers into the gas tank tends to be pretty messy, so we considered getting a fuel pump to make it easier. But decided not to.
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Ah air pump

This is a picture of the hand controlled air pump that Brian installed in the engine for pumping out excess air from the tubes. More on that later. Last night we made it to Mt Vernon, Illinois. I was having some allergies and decided to have a Benadril at around 11PM. Oh man, I slept well for a couple hours while Brian drove, then I took over for one terrifying hour of driving - I ate almost a whole bag of Maiz Tostada trying to stay awake (great stuff by the way, much better than corn nuts). . Finally I gave in, and we grabbed a hotel. Before putting out for the night, we put in $10 of diesel fuel to thin out the fuel for starting up again in the morning. Ah, sleep.

Unfortunately when morning came, we realized we hadn't pumped the air out of the engine. Brian was sure the engine wouldn't start, but with some serious air pumping (see picture) and the glory of the newly ordained car battery we got in Kansas - we got the car going again. A little anxiety for its first night on veggie fuel, but the car now drove, slept, and awoke on vegetable oil. And it was a good day. Good lesson - pump the air no matter how tired we are. Oh, we also learned - don't stop at weird looking gas stations in Illinois for lunch no matter how hungry you are.
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Somewhere in Indiana.jpg

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Defiance, Missouri

FYI: This post was supposed to be from Monday July 14th, 9PM.

Veggie car is now on it's first trip running 100% vegetable oil. We got a later start than we expected as Brian had to finish attaching heat conductors to the injection lines. There are heating pads around the filter also, with fuses installed to turn them off when the car is off. 

Here is the meat:  We have gone about 200 miles and used about 8 gallons of vegetable oil! So getting about 25 miles per gallon on this stuff! Brian says it is driving better than it was on diesel even, although lacks a little power on the hills. The engine is quieter and smoother he says.  And for the record, it is a very smooth ride. And my new yellow sunglasses fit in very well. The only thing that doesn't work so well is the speedometer, because the wrong size tires are on the car. So we the car thinks we are cruising at about 80 mph, but really we are rarely going above 60. The car can go faster, but it tends to use a lot more fuel. 

Have to thank Heather and Zeke for letting us stay that extra night while we prepared to take off. We are close to St Louis now, listening to podcasts and Defiance Ohio. Missouri is taking some time to get through. 

Final Preparations

Heather grabbed a video of us as we prepare to head out. Brian just has to fix some wiring and then we should hit the road towards Nashville. Man, it is a beautiful day in Kansas. Sun is strong, but the air is cool and fresh. As we were finishing up last night, I had the strange sensation that this place ISN'T haunted. I don't even really know what that means - but it just feels good around here. Surprisingly looks a lot like central New York - Brian and I keep commenting that it looks more like New York State than we expected.

Filtration System

Filtration System
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These pictures are all from last night (Sunday night). Notice it is still light out when we began the filtering...
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Our Pirate Booty

Our Pirate Booty
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Me Pumping

Me Pumping
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OK, got this shirt at a thrift shop and it is too small for me but did the job
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The Treasure

The Treasure
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The pump

The pump
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Fueled up and ready to Veg Out

I am writing this at 2:30 AM early Monday morning. Finally getting ready to get some sleep. Wow, what a long day. We are still in Lawrence, decided to spend one more night here. Actually, the oil filtration system decided for us, as it took much longer that we thought it would to filter the "harvested" oil. Getting the oil to begin with went great. We went back to the grease bin, and set up the pump system right there. Lawrence, being a college town, is pretty progressive, so we had some people walk by that seemed to give us a funny look for a second and then would give a "Oh, I know what you are doing" kind of look soon afterwards. No one really stopped to chat, but no one looked confused to see us either. We pumped the oil into many different containers: a couple of pickle buckets, an olive tub, and 2 other tubs that have special names but which are escaping me right now. We did 2 trips, filling 9 containers total. Since they were all about 5 gallons each, we got a total of 45 gallons of gas - and it only took us 10 hours from start to finish! OK, that may seem like a lot, but we ran into some difficulties along the way that taught us some lessons - like I said, the filtration system still needs some work.

So the oil needs to be run through these large fabric tubes, called "socks" (that name I remember because, uh, they look like big socks). We had to kind of jerry-rig some buckets together so the 4-foot-long socks could stand upright so the oil would flow through them. Passing this oil through the socks and buckets, and into other buckets. and then putting it either into the final buckets or putting it into the gas tank, turned out to be a massive task. At least one gallon of oil ended up on the street in front of Heather and Zeke's house. And all over our hands. And feet and flip-flops, and shorts, and t-shirts. I planned ahead, bought a t-shirt in a thrift store this morning. Brian of course planned ahead too - brought detergent. Excuse me - recycled detergent - one of our buckets was a bucket of "Joy" dish soap that had some left - so Brian bottled it up and that is what we cleaned up with. Nothing wasted with this guy. Even at 2 in the morning, when I was literally ready to throw in the greased up towels - Brian made sure we took the time to ring out each one into the final oil bucket. Why waste when you can not waste.
One thing that really surprised me was how my perception of the oil changed throughout the day. At first, when we came upon it in the "grease bin" out behind the restaurant, it had already lived its life and purpose of frying some kind of heart-wrenching food, and had been slumbering in this back alley for who knows how long. It was also the last thing I wanted to see, smell, or be near, let alone touch. Brian was nice enough to let me do the pumping so I didn't have to be right near the bin, but even then I was having plenty of thoughts of offering to buy a tank of gas so we could just get on the road and not spend my vacation hanging out with dumpsters. But throughout the day as we pumped it, collected it, filtered it, and finally funneled it into the gas tank, the stuff really did cease to be left over chicken wing grease, and transformed into this incredibly important and efficient liquid that would be able to power and lubricate the fantastic creation that is the car engine. It is difficult to explain the perception shift, except by telling you that at the end of the day I was squeezing this stuff out of rags as we got the last drops in to the buckets.
Since we stayed, I am writing this from Heather and Zeke's computer, I'll load up some pictures in the morning. Better get some sleep.

Thanks Vermont BBQ

Thanks Vermont BBQ
Originally uploaded by elliotpiano

We go in the place to ask if we can take their oil. Looks like it must be mostly from hotwings, how fitting for two guys from upstate NY. The bartender tells us we're not the first to ask, but said it had been awhile so she had to go check with the boss.. They kindly say no problem to letting us take as much oil as we need. She said thanks for asking. We promise to come back later for a beer, and maybe find out if there wings are as good as the buffalo wings we're used to ...probably not.
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Yellowish Brown Goldmine!!!

Yellowish Brown Goldmine!!!
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Searching for oil

Searching for oil
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Like speculators of old we canvas the lovely downtown area of Lawrence, Kansas for bins of oil, or Yellowish brown gold. This one we found behind Vermont BBQ. We look inside and......
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The New Battery

The New Battery
Originally uploaded by elliotpiano

Brian miraculously convinces some Missourians to grant the warranty on the old battery, despite not have the receipt..with him. Now the car starts like a charm. We now are heading back to Kansas for some hotdogs and beer.
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Veggie filter

Veggie filter
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This filters the veggie oil as it comes in from the gas tank
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1975 baby!

1975 baby!
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Brian and engine

Brian and engine
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Veggie Engine 1

Veggie Engine 1
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The old battery, some fuel valves
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Lawrence, Kansas

Lawrence, Kansas
Originally uploaded by elliotpiano

Picture of Brian, Zeke and Noah (the baby). We are staying with Brian's friends from Virginia, Zeke and Heather. Rained all day so far but it is now just starting to clear up. We are about to drive back to Kansas City so I can drop off this rental car and Brian can get a new battery for the veggie mobile. So I thought this would be a good time to explain some things that I have just learned.

1. Brian's car will run on just about anything dieselesque. As he says, anything that burns and doesn't explode will work. We stopped at a coop that had a grease bin out back, and we are heading back there later to siphon the old grease. Now once we get the grease, he has a filtration system that we will run it through to clean it so it can be put in the engine without leaving residue.

2. To burn fuels like vegetable oil you need to add heat. Once you add the right amount of heat it will burn like diesel. If it is not hot enough it will smoke and residue, but if it isn't smoking, it is happy. Pure veggie oil needs to be 180 degrees. Regular diesel fuel is not meant to burn at that high a temperature, so Brian had to modify the engine. Brian's engine loops the fuel so that the fuel gets hotter and hotter, constantly being pushed in and out of the fuel pump. Since the engine gets up to about 185 degrees when running. Of course if it is a really hot day out and you have been driving through, say, the Nevada desert.....

3. So veggie oil is thicker than diesel oil before it is heated up, so Brian had to modify the fuel line that goes from the gas tank to the engine. The original one was a skinny aluminum tube, and he said it was like sucking a milk shake through a skinny straw. So now the line is fatter, like the McDonald straws. Once it is heated the oil has same consistency as diesel and can run through the engine as normal. .

Oh boy, just discovered spell check on this thing.

OK, pictures coming
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First pic of the car

First pic of the car
Originally uploaded by elliotpiano

Brian just corrected me - it's a 1975 Mercedes, not a '76. More to come...
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Kansas City

Kansas City
Originally uploaded by elliotpiano

My first blog post from the midwest! From now on I'll be posting from my blackberry, which is kind of tricky to type with, so please excuse any spelling mistakes or what-not. Flew into Kansas City last night, went down to the 19th and Vine historical jazz district. Lots of jazz history here - Count Basie is the most well known jazz musician from this area, and his big band defines the Kansas City sound - bluesy, built upon riffs that the band plays together and then "riffs" off on. This pic is from the oldest joint in the area where they have jam sessions from 1:30am until dawn every weekend. And were very rpoud to tell me that they got a liquor license from the mayor so they could serve until 6 AM - same as they did during Prohibition. So to give you more of a picture- I rolled into the district wearing one of my fedora type hats, expecting to stand out like I usually do walking around Brooklyn - quite the contrary- I'd say 2 out of 3 people were wearing fedoras. Sweet.
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First Post - "What I Know"

What I know: Brian successfully got the car in Northern California - successfully performed the the bio-diesel/vegetable oil conversion - successfully repaired other mysterious ailments that the car had - drove to San Fransisco and stayed with our friend Lucas Freshman, then headed south. I know he made it to Las Vegas, and then to Arizona. He called me yesterday from New Mexico, about 50 miles from Santa Fe. He had some bank problems, and was unable to get any money out. He had $20 left and needs to get all the way from New Mexico to Kansas City in 2 days to meet me Friday night. This is exactly when the vegetable oil conversion came into play. He found a Mexican restaurant with some friendly staffers and Bada-bing, bada-bang, filled the car with left over chimichanga juice. Last I heard he was half way through Oklahoma, heading towards Lawrence Kansas.

The Veggie Mobile Project, or Zen and the art of Bio-Diesel Mercedes Maintenance

Hi Everyone -

I thought I would start a blog as a convenient way to track my travels over the next week (July11th - July 19th, 2008). Now, if you are looking at this Blog, it is probably because you know me and I told you to look at it, but in case this miraculously reaches someone that is outside of my immediate circle, I'll give a little overview of this trip and why I thought a blog would be worthwhile. It starts with Brian Kassel - Brian is a mechanical whiz friend of mine - always has been as good at fixing cars as he is at buying bad ones. Me, not being a whiz at cars, I can't even really tell you exactly what cars he has had over the past years. They can be summed up as a wide range of cars made between 1974 and 1982 that would drive most of us crazy if we tried to use them strictly for getting from one place to another. However, Brian doesn't see cars as a mode of transportation only. I think rather he sees them as an extension of the wheel, or the raft - getting it all strapped together is part of the fun.

So a few months ago Brian bought a car, I think from Ebay. If I remember correctly it is a 1976 Mercedes. Brian lives in New York state. Car is in California. Long trip. He tells me "Elliot, you should fly out to California with me and drive the car back cross country". "Are you sure it works?" I ask, knowing full well that this is a relative question. "Definitely, I am going to convert it to run on vegetable oil and bio-diesel when I get out there". Sweet.

We are both in our super early 30s, in fact, he is 30, I'm 31. Newly 31, but 31 nonetheless. I decided to join him, but I am not flying to California - I'm flying to Kansas City. Meeting him there are then driving back to New York City in time for a show on Saturday July 19th. Why do I think a blog is a good idea - not because I narcissistically think anyone cares about my continuing post-youth adventures, although some of you may (hi mom) - but because I think it is totally 2008 to be traveling cross country based on locally produced fuel, and I am excited to be a part of it. Like most of us, I am a total car layman who loves thinking about ways to become independent from oil, but I don't have the lifestyle, knowledge (or guts) to do it. SO, I'll be updating this blog from the road, using amazingly cool technology where I can email photos from my blackberry directly to this blog. Can't wait to get started. I fly out Friday night, July 11th, at 5:30 - I'll try to send my first post once I get to Kansas City.