The car that starred in Kill Bill (besides the Pussy Wagon, of course) was a fire-breathing 1980 Pontiac Trans-Am. Two cars were used in filming. Michael Madsen got to the studio lot before Daryl Hannah, so he got the better preserved of the two.

Hannah's car barely made it out of the parking lot, and because she prefers to drive alternative-powered vehicles instead of a 6.6-liter gas guzzler, it sat for years on flat tires in her garage

Riverwired.com reported that Hannah "plans to convert Elle Driver's 1980 T-top Trans Am from gasoline to electric power," but the truth is more interesting: It's running on alcohol. I got a close-up look at the Trans-Am last week in Los Angeles, at a forum titled "Alcohol for Sustainable Living" attended by both Hannah and Ed Begley, Jr.

The event was hosted by David Blume, author of Alcohol Can be a Gas, a fat volume on the wonders of alcohol fuel. Of course, another name for alcohol is ethanol, and it has taken flak for driving up the cost of corn and setting up a "food vs. fuel" controversy. Blume said that corn has been a victim of price fixing, and that the world is actually swimming in the stuff. He claimed we've actually had a corn surplus three years running.

Blume outlined some compelling visions of an alcohol-fueled future that would reform our current corn-based production. Ethanol has to get holistic, and take advantage of the system's epic amounts of waste. In particular, he said that stale doughnuts make great alcohol because of how much sugar (10 teaspoons) they contain. And I loved his vision for a closed-loop "living machine" that would produce alcohol from grain, then use the highly nutritious leftovers to feed fish, whose poopy water is great for growing cabbages. Don't think it can work? Archer Daniels Midland did it profitably for many years, Blume said, until the program was killed by a CEO from the oil industry.

We need to get internal combustion off the road, one way or the other.