The Big Green Bus Blog!: spontaneous comBUStion

When you (the reader) last heard from your heroes (us) we were in Boulder Colorado experiencing fine cuisine at The Kitchen, with every bite soaring closer to heaven than even Icarus could fathom. Now, six days later the crew is split due to a fuel pump failure in the bus. Four people, (Brent, Colleen, Frances and Chris) went on ahead to Telluride around 3 am on Tuesday morning in the chase car, leaving the remaining seven in Denver until the Bus could/ can be repaired.

Before we were separated however, we attended a few events with the chase car here in Denver. On Sunday, five of us visited reporters at the Capitol building, releasing the news that our bus had a bad case of the hiccups, and would be out of commission for a short period of time. From there we tabled with the little blue car (who we have renamed ‘Tiny Tim’) outside of Whole Foods, earning our food supply that will hopefully sustain us through the National Parks. To Brent and Merritt’s expected dismay, large steaks were not a main item on the shopping list.

On Monday, five crew members drove off to Boulder where they visited RMI, The Rocky Mountain Institute. RMI is an non-profit environmental think tank hired by corporations to consult them as to how they might make their company more green. The rest of the group went to the Denver Public Library where they happily (and quietly) embraced complete nerd-ness. Later the two halves met up in the growing green housing project Stapleton. Stapleton is a large planned community built entirely upon an old airfield, using recycled and green materials to accommodate a large number of families.

Since the Fellowship was broken on Tuesday, the crew left in Denver has had a very difficult time coping with the surroundings. Yes, we may be trampoline-jumping, art museum-visiting, cat-petting, and wine-drinking…but it’s just not the same without Frances, Chris, Brent, and Colleen. Sigh. I even cut Lucas' hair into a mohawk yesterday to try and distract me from my depression, but the curly red coif didn't fill the hole in my heart.

But tomorrow is a new day and a new part will be installed in our bus (don’t ask me which one though…) so with any semblance of luck, the Big Green Machine will be back on the road in no time.