Indeed My Truck Is Eating Chinese! :-)

On my last update I had just finished the conversion on my truck. Here are some pictures from my truck's maiden voyage running on Vegetable Oil from a local Chinese Restaurant!

These pictures are from last Saturday just after my previous update.

Gassing up, and getting ready!

More of Joanna's artistic touch as we drive out the driveway :)

Just having a blast vegging! :) LOL!

Snif, Snif... Is someone grilling, or is that my truck? Oh and I might ad... my truck smells DELICIOUS! :) To be honest it smells like someone has BBQ Chicken on the grill. :)

Snif, Snif... Is that us? NO! That's the farm down the road! Joseph apparently doesn't like the smell :) LOL!

More of Joanna's cool artwork as we drive home :)


Oh BTW: Be sure to watch the bottom of the side bar (to your right) to stay updated on how much money running on WVO can save someone!

WVO Update!

Last night I FINISHED My W.V.O. conversion! :) Ok "Finished" is never finished, but the current system is up and running! :) Here's some pictures from yesterday's final push to get it done.

Me under the hood again!

Just a little tip, disconnecting and re-connecting short rubber hoses behind an engine is difficult, and VERY UNCOMFORTABLE! Not recommended unless necessary. :)

An artistic photo by Joanna from inside the cab.

I LOVE MY BEAUTIFUL TRUCK! :)

WOW! That looks posed! But sorry, it's not, I'm actually working :)

Here's my little work area, fully equipped with a nice fan to shoo all the mosquitoes away! The mosquitoes were by far the biggest delay in this job. I couldn't work during the night because of all the bugs! But a fan did the trick, and I've been able to put in two late nights this week and get it DONE! :)

Another artistic photo by Joanna through the wonderful fan that kept all the Mosquito's away :)

The conversion is done! Here's a shot of me bleeding the fuel lines to remove the bubbles.

Almost There: WVO Conversion

For those of you who haven't heard, I'm working on converting my truck to run on Waste Vegetable Oil (WVO)!

I'm almost done, and I should be able to watch this thing eat Chinese within the week! :)

Stay tuned for a more detailed update once it's done.

The AUX tank install almost complete!

My Summer Math Course is DONE! :)

Last Wednesday was the Final Exam for a math course (Gen Ed Math) that I was taking at Rock Valley College in the Summer Interim III! It was a three week course that covered a full semester of work! The math teacher said it was not a condensed class at all! Anyway, it was by far the hardest class I've taken at RVC so far. We covered a little of statistics, geometry, trigonometry, algebra, logic, and more! Anyway, I spent all day Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday studying for the final exam, :/ but I think the exam went very well! PRAISE THE LORD!

On the way home from the Final Exam, I decided to stop at Wendy's for a Crispy Chicken Sandwich and a Jr. Cheese-Burger.
After I got my order at the drive through, I started driving away and thought to myself: Wait! I smell French fries! I opened my bag and in it was a medium french fries! YAY!... ...But wait!... Where is my Crispy Chicken Sandwich? Nope, not there, they left it out! So I went back and the lady at the drive-up told me to go to the second window and they'd fix my order. So I pulled up, they handed me another bag, and said, "I put your Chicken in there". I said "thanks!" looked in the bag, and what should I see but Chicken Nuggets! Not a Crispy Chicken Sandwich like I had ordered! I looked up and said "Oh, I didn't order Chicken Nuggets either! :)" She said "I know baby, I made those just for you!" I said "well thanks, but I DID order a Crispy Chicken Sandwich, can I?..." She said "that's in there also, under the nuggets, I made those just for you, sorry baby, didn't mean to mess up your order." I said "oh wow! Thank you so much!" And drove away quite happy with my $2 meal of Chicken Nuggets, Medium Fries, Jr. Cheese-Burger, and a Crispy Chicken Sandwich. :) But the story doesn't end there! By the time I got around to eating my Jr. Cheese-Burger, I opened it and realized that this was not a Jr! I got a full size burger! YAY! Now I was really happy! :)

I hope Wendy's messes up my order next time, and oh, I might ad... That's not the first time that that Wendy's has messed up my order. :) I guess you could call me a faithful patron from now on? I don't know, I really prefer Burger King... ...hmm... ...But that's another topic for another day. :)

Paintball Party Pictures

Hey everyone! Here are some pictures from the paintball party last saturday! It was so much fun! There were thirteen of us total, six on our team (the red team) and seven on the opposition (green). The green team totally dominated the field all day, except for one of the Revolutionary games, and the big fire fight at the end.

The big fire fight at the end of the day was my favorite. It was a full half hour of intence action. And, I might ad that we REALLY CREAMED THE OPPOSITION ON THAT ROUND! :). I shot a total of approx 1500 rounds all day, and 600 of those rounds were in that last fire fight! I must say that I am SO GLAD that the end of that round came when it did though, cause I only had 10 shots worth of co2 left! :) That's way too close for comfort! But the teamwork that we were able to excersize durring that last round made it everything!

THANK'S STRANDS FOR A WOUNDERFUL DAY! :)

Daniel Hill re-hydrating for a big day of paintball ahead.

Grant Iler re-thinking this whole idea of getting shot at :) LOL!

Stuart strand preparing his last words.



Joseph Erber locked, cocked, and ready to rock.

The green team preparing for battle near their main fort. Oh yeah, last thursday we tore down a fence from some lady's yard in Algonquin, so I brought those fence segments up to the Strands to use as barricades. That's what the fort was made out of, and we had a lot of them scattered around the woods.

Ethan Webb getting ready for another round.



The green team preparing for battle.



All the lady observers watching the Revolutionary area battle :)

The Red team preparing for the revolutionary style battle.

The red team in the favored position preparing to fire!

The troops starved, waiting to eat.

Here are a few other blogs with posts from the day: Joseph Erber, Grant Strand, Ethan Webb

Paintball Day Post Coming Soon!

Last Saturday was a big paint-ball day at the Strands house! There's a bigger update to come, so stay tuned! :)



Methinks Joanna got her hands on my gun and exercised some of her artistic talent? :)

My New Paintball Gun

In preparation for the Paintball Day that Grant Strand is hosting, I recently bought a Tippmann A-5. I got it in the mail on Wednesday, and today I finally had a chance to look at it, and take it out to do a little shooting.

Here's a picture of Caroline with it.

I let her shoot some, and boy is she trigger happy! :)

4th of July Party / New Glasses!

On July 4th the Yen family hosted our entire church + some other friends for a big Independence Day Celebration! We had a BLAST!

The festivities started around 1:30 when a bunch of people met at the Golf Course for a round of Golf. It was my first time, and it was so much fun! Fortunately we played best-ball, so while our team had the lowest score of all the teams it still wasn't terrible, esp. considering that three of the four people on our team had never played Golf before! Our team was made up of Mr. VonHolten, Luke VonHolten, Joseph and I. Needless to say, Mr. VonHolten held our team up :).

After Golf all the Golfers headed back to the Yen's house to join everyone else for a wonderful evening of food and games (football, egg toss, three legged races, and other different types of group games). Toward the end of the night it became apparent that the eggs used for the Egg Toss were VERY durable! So some of the people started throwing the eggs as high in the air as they could to see if they'd break when they hit the ground. Most of the eggs didn't break, but it did grow into more of an egg fight fight than anything. REALLY MESSY! :)

Thanks so much Yen's for the wonderful party!

Sorry, no Golf pictures :(

Josiah and I... We won the Egg Toss! Oh yeah, and there is a picture of me with the Glasses which I've had for about two months now!


Joanna and I... We won the Three Legged Race!

RVC Chamber Singers in Concert!

Hey Everyone! Here's a piece that we (The Rock Valley College Chamber Singers) performed at the end of the Spring '07 semester.

The microphones were at the front of the stage, so they definitely picked up the strings more than the vocalists. But I hope you enjoy it!


Movements 1-4


Movement 5


Movements 6 & 7

Jamestown 400 Trip - Vlog 01

Hey Everybody!

Yesterday I tried making this vlog post on our drive out to Virginia. Sorry, it is really rough, which is due to the fact that my computer can't handle video rendering very well. :-( Anyway, I hope you enjoy!

Video of The Day

The Elantra Sold!

I don't know how many of you have heard about the Hyundai Elantra that I had for quite some time. But after four months in the shop (with many parts being replaced or rebuilt) it has finally gotten out, and last Saturday it SOLD! Praise the Lord!

Also, since it was finally out of the shop, I got a chance to get some pictures of it. Here are a couple of them.

My new truck

A couple weeks ago I got a new truck! I've been looking for a Diesel to possibly convert to run on Vegetable Oil, but haven't found one that had what I wanted within my price range. Basically I was looking for three things:

• I wanted a GM pickup, (or Suburban or Blazer).
• It had to be a 1993 model or older (in 1994 they started using electronic fuel injection which is no good for vegetable oil).
• I also wanted it to be 4x4.
• I also wanted it to be a 1993 (since that was the only year that they made a 6.5L Turbo Diesel engine with mechanical fuel injection)
• It had to be under $1500
  

I would have been fine with one of the older non turbo 6.2L diesel engines, but ideally I wanted a 1993 with the 6.5L Turbo Diesel.

Basically what I wanted, and the price it had to be didn't match, so I was having a hard time finding anything half decent until...

This truck came along.

This is a 1993 (YAY!) Chevy (YAY!) Pickup (YAY!), with 4x4 (YAY!) and the 6.5L Turbo Diesel (YAY!). Best of all they were only asking $1200 (YAY again!).

The problem was that the ad said the engine was seized-up (Grr, not so good!). I decided to call the guy anyway and ask what the symptoms of the problem were. He proceeded to explain the problem, and I got to thinking it was more of a starter problem than an engine problem. I went to look at it and it wasn't even a starter problem! The only problem was that one of the starter bolts had broken, and the other had bent! So with $10 I headed over to Napa Auto Parts and picked up two new starter bolts.

Now have have a great running truck that I couldn't have found anywhere else for less than $3500 at the least! I am so excited. It has a new:

• Transmission
• Torque Converter
• Alternator
• Gas Tank
• Radiator
• Tires
• Exhaust system
• and now it even has two new starter bolts :-).

This truck runs and drives great, and has almost no rust at all! Oh, it also came with fender flares, mud flaps, and a tough looking chrome farm bumper (on the rear)! I couldn't have asked for a nicer truck at this price. I can't wait to get it converted and start driving it for free!

Concerts Friday and Saturday, April 20 & 21

Hey everybody! The Rock Valley College Concert Choir, Womens Choir and Chamber Singers are going to be putting on a joint concert Friday and Saturday, April 20 & 21 at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Rockford!

I am in the Concert Choir and the Chamber Singers, but I'm obviously NOT in the Womens Choir.
There are also two pieces that I'll be playing the piano to accompany the Concert Choir on. So if you've got either of the nights open, I'd love to see you there!

Tickets are $5 for adults and $4 for students. The concert begins at 7:30pm.
If you've got any questions feel free to send me an email, or post a comment.

Update! 4-15-07

Oh my word! I can't believe it's the middle of April already! Here's a little update of what's been up over the past couple weeks.

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I've been very busy with school, esp. with all the piano and voice practice that I've been doing. Much of my practice time lately (basically all of it) has been towards a couple pieces that I'm accompanying the RVC Concert Choir on! They're both really neat. One is the 7th movement of the Beethoven Choral Fantasy (wow! that one is just plain fast!!), and the other one is a gospel piece "John the Revelator". This one is a lot of fun, and VERY different in style from anything I've played in the past.

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A couple weeks ago we housed a few boys from Bradley University after a concert that their Chorale and Chamber Singers gave. They were a great bunch of guys, and I really enjoyed their visit and the concert (which by the way was incredible!).

Here's a picture of me with the boys we housed, right before they left the next morning.

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Would you believe it! We got a snow storm this week! How crazy is that! This is April right?

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My Elantra remains locked up at the mechanic waiting for yet another replacement part to the electrical system. This should be in tomorrow, and it should be the last part.

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Yesterday the RVC Chamber singers (of whom I am a part), were guests at a concert by the RVC Consortium. This was so much fun! The RVC Consortium string ensemble (with whom we had the honor of doing a joint piece) were good beyond what my own uneducated pen can express. They were really seriously good, but I'm not even going to try to continue telling you how good they were. We sang Bach's Cantata #150 (with the Consortium), and then two pieces on our own: "Adijo Kerida", and "Done Made My Vow".


Afterwards, we went out for pizza which was fun, and, oh... It was one of the girl's birthday, so we sang "Happy Birthday". You can imagine me thinking, wow! I'm about to sing "Happy Birthday" with the Chamber Singers! This will probably be one of the best performances of this song I have ever heard! No! I was totally WRONG! I don't know if "Happy Birthday" is too far below the Chamber Singers for them to even consider stooping to that level, or what! But apparently it wasn't worth singing to them, so it was sung (or yelled) much louder and more monotone (right in the middle of the restaurant mind you) than I have ever heard this song sung! Boy, I REALLY wish that was recorded.

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There should be more regular updates to come, but no promises until the middle of May.

On Christ, the solid rock, I stand.

This is one hymn that I have found myself singing a lot lately. It is always a refreshment and inspiration to me.


My hope is built on nothing less
Than Jesus’ blood and righteousness;
I dare not trust the sweetest frame,
But wholly trust in Jesus’ Name.

Refrain

On Christ the solid Rock I stand,
All other ground is sinking sand;
All other ground is sinking sand.

When darkness veils His lovely face,
I rest on His unchanging grace;
In every high and stormy gale,
My anchor holds within the veil.

Refrain

His oath, His covenant, His blood,
Support me in the whelming flood;
When all around my soul gives way,
He then is all my Hope and Stay.

Refrain

When He shall come with trumpet sound,
Oh may I then in Him be found;
Dressed in His righteousness alone,
Faultless to stand before the throne.

Refrain

~ Edward Mote

Random Photo of the Random Moment: Sweet Ride?

Random Photo of the Random Moment: Hmm... Sweet Ride?

We saw this truck when we were in Maine a few years back. Not sure who the artist was, but a major commendation on the job!

Call Of Duty

Last Saturday we had some friends over to play Call Of Duty for my Birthday. It took us a while to get everything installed, but thanks to Daniel Hill and Grant Iler (who set up the LAN) all the computers connected very smoothly.

Many thanks to everyone that contributed to the evening! I had a blast (literally :-), and I hope everyone else that came did also. Here are some pictures from the evening.

Team 1 from left to right: Myself, Luke VonHolten, Nathan DeLadurantey, Ethan Webb, and Sebastian Fowlks (plus Tom DeLadurantey who you can't see hidden in the back on the other side of Ethan)

Team 2 from left to right: Grant Strand, Josiah Erber, Grant Iler, Joshua Erber, Daniel Hill, and Joseph Erber.

Spring Has Sprung!

Wow! Talk about warm (or HOT!) weather today! I think it got up to 72 degrees this afternoon!
I took a nice long bike ride today and didn't feel cold for a split second!

I love this weather!
It better not get any hotter for a while, I think I'd melt.

Um, Hello?!?

Yes, I am still alive - but just barely! I've been swamped with school stuff (lots of music), and haven't really had time for anything other than that.

Liberty Day was a couple weeks back, which went very well! I personally had a lot of fun and I hope all the attendees were blessed.

(Click HERE, HERE, HERE, or HERE to see pictures)

On the car front, things haven't been going too well at all. A 1988 s10 pickup that I had blew a head-gasket a week and a half after I got it (I didn't lose anything on that, but I sure didn't make as much as I wanted!). Overall it was definitely worth getting the truck. It was a lot of fun driving around in a beater with that much guts, and let me tell you, that thing had guts!

My 1994 Hyundai Elantra GLS has been one problem after the next.
1: Due to some bad idle speed sensors I had to get those replaced.
2: Due to a tiny hole in the block and a jumped timing chain I had to get the engine replaced.
3: Due to a bad computer the car wouldn't start and the computer had to be replaced.
4: Due to the new computer I can now read all the codes and see everything else that is wrong with my car. Grr...
5: Due to a bad air-flow sensor I had to get that replaced.
6: Due to the fact that I was told I could pick up my car today from the shop, I drove 50 minutes just to find out that it wouldn't be ready until tomorrow.

Would somebody please accidentally run into my car so that your insurance will replace it?!?!

We'll see what tomorrow holds...

(Ok, that's not actually my car - mine is bright red, but that is what it looks like when I'm driving! ;-)