In the first 48 hours since we announced our plan and goal, we raised $13,388.

Today's big development in donations: an anonymous donor has made a challenge offer to match the next $5,000 that comes in. If you step forward, we'll be close enough to Washington to coast in.

We're now at 54% toward our destination -- we'll soon update our map at http://www.calcars.org/­phevtodc.html. This is the URL where we hope those of you who haven't yet contributed will visit. I know that many of you don't read every email you get, but I still am hoping that a very substantial number of our supporters will send contributions.

If you've seen today's postings to CalCars-News, we hope you'll appreciate even more the value of having this car in Washington next week. With Ford saying, "We have nothing to announce today, but yes, we are keenly looking at it," we hope having our car in DC will be the factor that pushes them to decide to move ahead. (See the original posting explaining our Washington event at http://www.hybridcars.com/­blogs/­power/­help-send-calcars-to-dc. And see a new blog entry where you can comment about Ford at http://www.hybridcars.com/­blogs/­power/­ford-keen-interest-in-phevs.

Again, that URL to click is http://www.calcars.org/­phevtodc.html. Thanks to all of you who have supported or are considering supporting this event, CalCars in general, and plug-in hybrids.

(By the way, the "keen" quote came from the initial Reuters story sent out about Ford's annual meeting -- that exact statement didn't appear in later versions, but you can find it at http://today.reuters.com/­business/­newsarticle.aspx?type=ousiv&storyID=2006-05-11T143723Z_01_N11209816_RTRIDST_0_BUSINESSPRO-AUTOS-FORD-DC.XML.