[Sca-cooks] OT & OOP: Greasecar?

[Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius]

Also sprach ysabeau:
>One of the guys I work with has an "old" diesel Mercedes four door
>sedan that is runs on vegetable oil. He has an arrangement with
>our cafeteria to get their old grease, then he takes it home and
>strains it. It is kind of funny because his exhaust smells like
>french fries or fish or whatever was cooked in the oil. I told him
>that if he really wanted to be cruel he would get the oil from
>Krispy Kreme so he would drive down the highway scenting it with
>donuts during the morning commute. He might even be able to get
>Krispy Kreme to pay him for doing it! He said he gets good mileage
>on it...he can get from Austin to San Antonio (about an hour to
>two hours, depending on where you start and finish) on about 2
>gallons of vegetable oil.

Yesterday my son and I were walking down the street, and as we passed 
a certain well-known fast-food franchise, he reached up and smacked 
me on the back of the head. I asked him what the expletive deleted he 
thought he was doing, and he reminded me about the line in the film 
"Super Size Me" about aversion therapy and the plan of one of the 
camera crew to smack his kid every time they passed a McDonald's, so 
the child would grow up living in fear of such places. I had to 
remind Brennan that I already live in fear of such places.

But one interesting thing is that McDonald's oil smells like 
McDonald's food, not just from the food cooked in it, but also from 
the relatively non-volatile chemicals added to enhance the flavor of 
what would otherwise be a relatively ordinary French Fry, Chicken 
Poopy, or whatever. I agree; there might be advertising potential 
there.

>He said that he didn't have to do much conversion on his car to
>get it to run on vegetable oil because it is an older diesel
>engine. The modern diesel engines won't do it without major
>conversion.
>
>My theory is...The US is one of the largest producers of vegetable
>oil, if not THE largest, we are paying the farmers to not plant
>crops because there is such a surplus...so why not promote this as
>an alternative, sustainable energy source? It would also keep the
>used oil out of the environment, in a way. Instead of regular and
>premium, you can have new or recycled.

Yes, but THE MAN doesn't want you to stop using petroleum! ;-)

Sorry, I just had an attack of the sixties...

Adamantius (who, attack of the 60's notwithstanding, basically does 
believe that)
-- 
  "Why don't they get new jobs if they're unhappy -- or go on Prozac?"
	-- Susan Sheybani, assistant to Bush campaign spokesman Terry 
Holt, 07/29/04