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