Archive for the ‘Aptera’ Category

Praying Small

Monday, June 28th, 2010

Benson’s parents were nice enough to have the kids for a night so we can do date night.  So this past weekend Benson & I slid over to North Hollywood’s “NoHo Arts District” and saw a play entitled “Praying Small” at the Noho Arts Center.  Our friend Rob Arbogast was one of the actors in the play.  It just makes it that much more exciting to see a friend act in a production.

The play tells this guy’s story about his addiction to drugs and alcohol.  Sounds depressing right?  Totally wasn’t.  There was even some scenes that had some comedy, and even a love scene that made you cry.   I kept thinking throughout the play, amazed at the talent of all the cast.  They all could be huge movie stars or tv stars based on their amazing character portrayals.  Rob played 3 different characters who were all alcoholics.  He played a redneck father, introverted carpet cleaner guy at his first AA meeting, and the main character’s best friend/enabler “Roman.”   He rocked each one of them and totally had me convinced.  I saw him after the show and to my surprise he was sober lol.  He’s just that good of an actor.  The main character played by Clif Morts was amazing too. During his monologue a cell phone was going off for a straight minute and he didn’t flinch one bit.  He was so focused and in to his part.  It was a truly amazing cast and if you’re looking for something different to do, check out the play!

Its only the third week in running and they already have a review in the LA Times. Here is another review as well.

You can get discounted tickets on GoldStar.com.

Cheers to Praying Small!

Aptera Update
Aptera is nearing the end of their Knockout Qualifier. They have been doing a series of road tests to calculate everything from their emissions, MPGe, braking, acceleration, battery life etc.  There is a live stream during the day that shows all the cars on the track.  The details of the Competition Events are here.  Aptera is in the Alternative (Side-by-Side) class, where winner takes home $2.5 mil!  Aptera is looking great out there.

Here are some videos from their competition events for breaking and skid-pad:

XPRIZE Braking Event – 06.28.2010

XPRIZE Skid Pad Event – 06.28.2010

Best of luck to Aptera!

XPRIZE Telemetry Site

Tuesday, June 22nd, 2010

XPRIZE released their Telemetry Site so you can view the competing cars’ telemetry like current speed, MPGe, carbon footprint etc.  This week they’re at Michigan International Speedway doing a series of runs on the course.

Aptera, (which is my team) is competing tomorrow, Wednesday, 6/23,  in the “Knockout – Efficiency Test City” at 3:00pm EDT / 12:00pm PDT.

The schedule is here

and the telemetry site is here (just click on “Live”).



Go Aptera!


XPRIZE & more GirlDrifting in JP

Friday, May 28th, 2010

So I work at Idealab in their Finance division.  Idealab incubates start-up companies.  One of the accounts I handle is Aptera.  They’re a car manufacturer building an EV (electric vehicle) that will get 250mpg equivalent.  They have 4000 people waiting in line to buy one when it comes out.  Its a hot new auto manufacturer and I’m lucky enough to work on that account.  I’ve been helping their procurement division, which means, I’ve been buying all the stuff they need to make the cars and paying all the bills for them.  Being an accountant is boring sometimes, but when you have a fun account like this you learn so much about what goes into building a car from the ground up.

Aptera entered the Progressive Automotive XPRIZE Competition, which boasts a $10mil prize purse.  The object of the competition is to build the most fuel efficient vehicle that still is practical enough to mass produce and sell.

Check out Aptera’s interview with Progressive Insurance’s Flo below and check out their profile page on the XPRIZE Site.  Good luck to Aptera!

Gal Drifting
You wanted it and you got it. More girl drifting in Japan from NoriYaro.

Here is a pic of Sachiko’s car in Japan.  I feel some connection with her because my Japanese name is Sachiko and my car is pink too lol.  She wins though on interior…how does she pass tech inspection!?   My pink dildo shifter and 3 beanie babies is nothing compared to this insane drift car interior.  I’m inspired.  Go Team Sachiko!!!!

SATC2
I was one of the many hundreds of thousands of women who saw Sex & the City 2 last night (Thursday).  Perez is posting that it brought in $14.2mil Thursday alone!   It was great for a sequel.  The drama wasn’t as insane like the first one, but it was funnier and its awesome that the characters are evolving.  They’re like pokemon!

Enjoy your long BBQ weekend!