I have no idea what will happen.

I'm not sure when I got hooked, but sometime in the last decade I heard my first episode of the old radio adventure show Box 13. It starred Alan Ladd as Dan Holliday, a fiction writer who works for a newspaper to pay the bills. In order to get ideas for his fictional stories, he places an ad in the newspaper that reads "Adventure Wanted. Will go anywhere, do anything." and asks the reader to write to box 13 care of the newspaper with their offers of adventure. Holliday would follow up on the intriguing letters and, more often than not, he would get wrapped up in murders, kidnappings, and other assorted crimes. The show only lasted one year (1948-1949) and had 52 episodes.

I wasn't born until 1970, so I never heard a live episode of it. I probably heard my first episode on a late night AM radio show. Being a writer who gets most of his ideas from real life experiences, newspaper clippings, and snippets of overhead conversations, I loved the idea of Dan Holliday openly advertising for adventure (and thus ideas).

I'm a Renaissance man. If I'm not writing, I'm working a full-time job for the city (a small town in northern Indiana) cooking, studying martial arts, collecting DVDs, DJ'ing, composing dance music, playing blues harmonica, raving about some band none of my friends have heard of yet, expounding on the virtues of cult films, traveling, or learning some new skill.

Those last two things are probably what led to this new decision. I also got my first passport this year, at the ripe young age of 37, so the world is now my destination. The passport is what gave me the nudge to emulate Dan Holliday.

So, today (July 21, 2008), I rented box 213 at the post office. Box 13 wasn't available, but I was happy to receive 213. I look at it as the sequel to box 13. My plan is to advertise for adventure. I will advertise in newspapers and wherever I go by way of hand-written index cards and printed business cards. I am tempted to use the Internet to advertise, but just looking at Craigslist makes my eyes hurt and there are over seven million Google hits on "free classified ads." None of the first few I looked at seemed worthy of either my trust or effort. Besides, Dan Holliday didn't have the Internet and he did pretty well (except for getting clubbed on the back of the head or framed for murder now and then).

My wife, Veronica, thinks this is a potentially expensive idea, and she's right. I have no idea how much money I will spend on this venture. I also have no idea how long I plan to do it. I have the post office box rented for at least six months, so that's a good start.

There was also some discussion with Veronica on how I plan to word my advertisement. Veronica thought the "do anything" part of Holliday's ad left an opening for me to get involved in illegal activities. I considered changing it to "do anything legal," but Dan Holliday didn't worry about such things. Plus, I don't have to answer every letter. Dan Holliday didn't. I'll keep the wording the same.

I think I'll start with local advertisements and work up from there. The local library has a good mix of local and national newspapers, so I'll be able to place the ad in everything from our small town paper to USA Today. I'll also seek out local papers as I travel so I can advertise in them.

I have no idea what will happen. Maybe nothing much and no one will ever hear of my quest for adventure, but maybe I'll be jetting to France to help a vineyard fix a wine press or getting involved with a femme fatale who wants me to uncover the secret behind her rich uncle's mysterious suicide.

One thing's for certain, however. Veronica loves me and gave me the "Okay." for this project, but, as usual, I'm sure she thinks I'm nuts.