Frank Vascellaro ST. LOUIS PARK, Minn. (WCCO) ― "American Chopper" is a very popular cable TV show, with more than 120 episodes going into syndication. The stars of the show were in St. Louis Park on Monday afternoon to show off their latest creation.

Paul Teutul and his sons operate Orange County Choppers, where they build some of the most exclusive and expensive motorcycles in the world. Monday's event featured the unveiling of a custom bike commissioned by a Minnesota businessman.

The invitation-only party was thrown by Steve Schussler, a businessman who gave us the Rainforest Cafe and many other theme restaurants. His theme for this gathering is simple:

"With what's happening with the economy and the world, to have a little bit of a break, and enjoy something that's nice. And something that's charitable and giving something back," Schussler said.

"Looks like a lot of people, looks like a lot of fun, and waiting to see the new bike, and see the crew from the show," said spectator Sara Erickson of Jordan, Minn.

The crew from "American Chopper" came to Minnesota to deliver a custom built Harley Davidson styled to look like a miniature 1957 Chevy convertible.

"This bike took longer than any other bike that we ever built," said Paul Teutul Sr. of Orange County Choppers

While everyone got a chance to see this work of motorcycle art, no one got an answer to the question "How much did it cost?"

"That bike is absolutely priceless, priceless, I, er, it's a priceless bike, no doubt," said Teutul.

To get into this party, you had to make a donation to Smile Network International, a Minnesota Charity that does facial reconstruction surgery in third world countries. By the end of the day, more than $10,000 were collected, enough to impress even a tough biker.

"I was absolutely, totally surprised, yea, generous people here, absolutely," Teutul said.

A lot of the money raised came from people who were willing to donate $500 to have their picture taken with the Teutuls.

New Episodes of American Chopper

• 10/09/08 @ 9:00PM(EST) - Steve Wyrick & Icee Bikes
  OCC takes on two builds: a custom bike for illusionist Steve Wyrick and a custom bike for ICEE. The guys have a hard time pulling off their first trick - an invisible gas tank. And the crew cools off by bringing their family to work for a sweet treat.
• 10/16/08 @ 9:00PM(EST) - Aaron Bike
• 10/23/08 @ 9:00PM(EST) - Dodge Ram Bike
• 10/30/08 @ 9:00PM(EST) - Schussler Bike

October 9th - 10th , 2008
Tune in on October 9th at 7:00PM EST and October 10th at 2:00AM EST to see the Teutuls and OCC the Band live on QVC to launch the exclusive OCC product line created just for QVC

OCC Motorcycles Newburgh A Schwinn Scooters Dealer

QVC Live OCC Show

*MY battle with addiction*

This isn't the most easy thing to admit or address on the internet, myspace or anywhere, but feel its fair to my friends, or even supports/fans to know the situation I have been going through the past few months. 

I'd say it started in February this year, or maybe a bit sooner.  I had a bad headache one night, and I tried to take tylonol or even extra strength excedrin to ease the pain in my head and also my back.  It didn't work. As I continued to complain about the pain, my mom basically gave up and told me to take one of her pain killers, a very highly seeked street drug, and heavily protected drug called Oxycontin.  You may have heard of it. It's very very potent and strong, and it works!.  However, my curiosity started getting the best of me. After that night, it seemed I wanted more.  Not because it took my pain away, but it made me very happy, and almost numb to any worries or problems.  Even though I vowed in my life to never ever touch any kind of recreational drug of any kind unless I truly needed it. Well I crossed that line, and as weeks went by i became hooked on these pills.  I just couldn't get enough of them each night. What started out as just 1, ended up being 3 a night.  Soon that wasn't enough either, so I took a couple lower dose one's.  This along with my anti-depressent drug called paxil.  I really had no good reason to take these. I love my life, I have great things going for me, and I am a very happy person most of the time.  I got great friends, family, and of course... My pillar... OCC!. 

However, I was taking them from my mom without her knowledge and managed to get away with it for months until last week she found a bottle of them in my room in plain view.  Suprisingly she didn't freak out on me or anything. She just wanted to know why, and she was more scared for me and my health than anything. She told me frightening things that could've happend to me as a result of my taking the drugs.  That scared me as well . She said I could've just died in my sleep and not even know it or feel it. Much like Anna Nicole Smith for example.  Or her son, Daniel.  And countless of other celebs or people who overdosed on pain killers.  As what you might call punishment, my mom demanded I admit myself into rehab. I was hesitant at first, but after thinking about it, I knew it was the right thing to do. So last Monday evening, I checked myself in.  And i was absoulutey speechless at the things I seen in there, things I heard, things i couldn't believe with my own eyes. The stories I heard, and people I met. I made me wonder why I was even in there because I was nothing compared to these people who are suffereing terribly from their addictions.  I didn't consider myself an addict.  But then I realized, if I wasn't why would I want to keep taking them? So pretty much means, I am/was an addict.  My life changed dramatically in that week i was in there.  Every pleasure or vice I had in my regular daily life was gone. Not much TV, and i am also quite addicted to caffiene, and was allowed only 1 can of soda a day when I ate lunch, and limited internet time, and little to no tv. But I was able to convince them to let me watch last week's SE WEB BIKE episode, thank god. That was something I drastically needed to help me relax and put my mind at ease.  That helped me cope with the remainderof my stay in a huge huge way. Once again, they proved why they are my heroes. Namely Paulie!> In the worst set of circumstances I've ever endured in my life, besides my mom getting very sick the last few years, this was the hardest thing I've ever had to deal with. But with support from friends, my girlfriend DAWN who wrote me on myspace every day, and Michelle, and Caitlin, and others, and Of COURSE... OCC! I made it through. And I know I was supposed to actually stay 30 days, but checked myself out early. I checked out this morning and decided to go to the meetings once a week to update my progress. 

REHAB is the one place,along with jail I thought I 'd never ever be in.  Goes to show even the most seemingly normal and nice people can make mistakes, and suffer the consequences.  Now I truly am blessed to be home,back in my own comfortable enviornment. I can hold my mom, my beautiful cat, Mookie, talk to my friends on the phone, and go to my OCC heaven of a bedroom and watch the guys all night long!!!.  And take a warm bath.  And throw back a bottle of Diet Dr Pepper or two, or three lol. 

People I wanna thank for helping me through this time are:

my mom, my sister, my girlfriend Dawn, Cat, Michelle, Caitlin and the boys at Orange County Choppers! Paulie, Sr, Mikey, Rick, Jason, and the crew.! Thank you from the bottom of my heart.  ~

Hopefully i will get the chance to speak to Paulie about this endeavor since he himself went through it at 16 yrs old. Maybe in October I will get that oppurtunity. In closing, thank you all for the love and support.

god bless everyone,

god bless my friends, family, and OCC,

love, and peace,

the one and only,

TIM "TEUTUL" AKA OCC FANATIC 1

GO TEAM JUNIOR!~~~~

Before I get started, I wanna say that just when you think the trips to OCC can't get any better, they do, and do they ever. This time was no exception. It was absoulutely phenomenal getting to go there again and spend time with the guys and fellow fan club members. It was fantastic, and might I dare say it was the most successful trip to OCC so far for me. It was amazing, and I got to relive everything all over again, and then some. And I seemed to get more time at the HQ than at the Grand Opening, and the guys were alot more open and available to talk to fans , and myself than at the Grand Opening as well, which was great. So, all the guys were expecting me there and I didn't let them down. I MADE IT!. Dont' worry, a much more thorough recap of the weekend will be up soon, but for now I just wanna discuss some of the highlights from the weekend for now, and my pics will be up ASAP on my OCC site, and my paulie pics will be up on my paulie page as well so stay tuned. And my flight was fantastic and not bad at all. I handled it extremely well, being it was my first time flying. So, now that i've flown, I don't wanna take a train again lol. It was such an upgrade it was crazy!!!. HEHE. Now moving on to the highights of my weekend, and my 4th trip to OCC!!...

My top 10 highlights of the weekend:
1. Meeting Paulie/Getting 3 pictures with him (My first time with Paulie was great because I got to talk to him about my tribute page I made for him, and he told me how much he liked it and he seemed glad to see me, and i told him I'd be in Portland for the Roadshow in Oregon and he told me i better be there!, and then he signed a couple pics for me. One he signed with my own silver marker, which were given to all fanclub members by the way and props to whomever took that fabulous poster the members got as well. I will post the poster soon. Nice shot of the Teutuls in front of the HQ , and Paulie is sitting on the Giants Bike!. Gorgouse pic wow!. But I then asked him if I could take a pic with him when he was done signing, and he said of course, so I waited for him to finish, after I stood and took lots of pics lol, and he walked right over to me, but he was soon ambushed by fans lol, and i let a couple of them go first, and then I went over to him and got the pic. I didn't wanna take up much more of his time, and let other fans get their pic with him, but he's definitely very comfortable around me now, and I think my friend Dawn's talk with him really really helped!)I also was able to hand deliver him a huge envelope of all new artwork I did for him., MOst of which can be seen on my Paulie page. PLUG PLUG lol.l

2. PAULIE WAVING AT ME!!! : Yes Paulie waved at me. On Friday, me and my friend hung around the shop until closing, and a number of the guys walked around and saw me and i guess they werent' able to come out, but they saw me and then at one point, Paulie saw me clear across the shop and he waved right at me!. I then signaled for him to come out and he was walking right to me, and then some overzealous fan started screaming his name for him to come out and she did it more than once, and i was in shock, and people think I'm out there? This lady was over the top, and there were afew other fans out there who did the same thing multiple times. I don't blame them for being excited, but they need to calm down a bit. They will walk out when the time is right and when they are able to. Remember these guys are at work!. Let them come to you!!!. But it didn't take away from the significance of him waving at me. It was very special to me. I will cherish that moment. THANK YOU PAULIE! Never thought a simple wave could mean so much, well it did! .

3. Meeting Mikey and Sr outside : on Friday, we waited, and fans were lined up outside, and first Sr came out carrying about 3 boxes of Lugz to put in his truck, and he asked me to open his door for him but someone else jumped ahead of me to do it. That happened alot that weekend lol. But it's cool. Anyways, getting a picture with Sr has eluded me everytime i've been there other than in August 2006 which was my first time there. But I finally got a new which I will post ASAP. And shortly after, Mikey came out and he said "hey tim good to see you, how was your trip?" and I said it was good and i told him I finally flew and he was suprised. I wanted to get a quick pic with him before he went back in, because he was being called back in. But i had to ask if Paulie was still in there, because he was coming out a couple times. He said he was coming out and then he got pulled back to go to a bike approval meeting , and was held up for hours already. I just said for mikey to tell him i'd see him tomrrow (Saturday) and that I got stuff for him. So it was cool . Most of the time we were sitting right next to Paulie's truck and at one point, they brought out a brand new bike. I will tell you what bike it is, but wanna make sure before I post pics if it's ok for me to do so. They just did a DODGE RAM bike! And let me tell you, it's killer!! It's amazing. Wait until yousee this thing. It's phenomenal. WOW. We thought we were gonna see a test ride of it, because the camera crew was hooking stuff up to the back of a truck, but i guess we missed it. But the bike is sharp and amazing. If I am allowed to put pics up I will. So Storm or Greg, let me know if I can.

4. Hanging out with friends/FanClub members : Quite a few fanclub members showed up (Me, Dawn, PohlGirl (Michelle), Caitlin (OCCGurl), CHopperDave, kelsey, Randi(UPSMAN, Mel, OCC-NY and her husband. ANd it was just great to see them again, and spend time with them. I loved it. Especially my time with Dawn, Michelle, Caitlin and Mel. They are like my best friends in the world and I love em to death. I love you guys!!! THanks for helping make my 4th trip the BEST so far! HUGZ.

5. Seeing the Gander Mountain Bike at Gander MTN: This was a shot in the dark totally. We had to go to Gander, because Dawn had to buy a gun case, and when we walked in, it just so happend that the bike was in there!. And I couldn't believe it. WOW. I said to dawn, omg the bike is here, and she looked around and she saw it and flipped out. Yes, the Gander bike is there as we speak and the thing is incredible. WAAAAY nicer in person. One of the coolest bikes to see in person I must say. I got lots of pics of it,and one of me standing by it. Loved it. SO glad it was there.

6. Hanging out at the WORLD HQ Saturday night/Sunday Morning: ME, Dawn, Mel, her husband, Caitlin and Michelle hung out at the WOrld HQ Saturday night/Sunday morniing. Initially I just wanted to get some night time pictures, but once again, ended up staying there on the steps and just talking. It was relaxing,a nd I was at my happy place. The best place in the world for me. It was just great! WOW.

7. Seeing Paulie's new dog, Abraham: Yes Yes Yes. IT's true.; Paulie finally has his own puppy. During his 1st signing on Saturday, his new Girlfriend Rachel brought him to the signing for a few moments and he started getting into stuff, so he got taken away before I coulld pet him, but Paulie got the doggy itch and he couldn't help it anymore lol. The kind of dog he has is a rodesian ridge back. Hard to spell. I might not have the spelling correct but you may know what kind of dog I am talking about. I got a couple pics of him on my paulie page. He's adorable, and now I know what kind of dog I'm getting lol. Well, that or a black lab of course.

8. Meeting Paulie again on Sunday: Not too much diffrent happened, but any time I can see Paulie, it's a true gift. He is my idol and my favorite person in the world. Thank you Paulie for taking time to take pics with me and talk to me for a few minutes. I appreciate it more than you can imagine. God bless you!!!

9. Hanging out with Jane, the receptionist: Jane is such a sweetheart, and she's tolderated me for almost 3 years. I've sent OCC multiple packages over the years and she's always the one to give them to the guys no matter what it is. NO matter how big of small lol. And i never really met her until this trip and so I finally got to do it, and it was so funny because on the table she was selling the posters at, it has a bunch of doodling on it and so I decided to add my own personal Tim "TeutuL" touch to it so I doodled the logo, and the Teutuls on it. ANd I warned Joe I would be drawing him next lol. It was great spending time with jane. She's awesome, and so easy to talk to . She thinks very highly of me, and my artwork and how much I love OCC. Jane if u read this, THANK YOU!. And I know I've been slacking sending packages to the guys, but that'll change. Don't you worry lol. Hugz.

10. Signing my 1st 3 autographs: Yes believe it or not, I was at the table with Jane, and these kids, and even a couple grown ups saw me and thought I was Paulie, and wanted my autograph, and one even asked where was my brother? I looked at Jane and Dawn and was shocked. And I said the 1st thing I could think of.. "He's sleeping" meaning Mikey!. And I even told then I wasn't Paulie, and that I wouldn't sign his name, which didn't. I signed my own name, TIM "TEUTUL" AKA OCC FANATIC 1. I signed 2 posters and something else. I don't remember what it was. Rules or a manual for the video game I think. When Paul Sr and Paulie saw that I signed these posters they busted out laughing. They looked over at us and had the biggest grin on their face lol. It was classic, and honored to sign my 1st autographs. I know it won't happen too often, but glad it did. My name is really getting out there!. People I didn't even know walked over to me and asked me about my tribute pages. I couldn't believe it. It was great.

Other highlights:
1. The OCC bicycle. (Wait until you see this beautiful piece. It's a bicycle someone if California made , and it's actually the OCC logo. The body is the c in the middle, the rear wheel has the o, and the front wheel has the other C. It's amazing. I got pics of it, but I think Randi and Kelsey got pics of it, so I will let them post em if they want to, and

2. Talking to Joe : JOe is great, and he's always walking around making sure everyone is having a good time. I could talk to him forever. He's a great guy and a true ascet to OCC. He thinks very highly of me. He told his girlfriend Katrina all about me. HEHE. Joe your AWESOME and your' gonna get your own appreciation thread in here soon. don't worry!

Well, thats all I got for now, but I am on cloud nine of course and on top of the OCC world. I am sooo happy, and things couldn't have gone better this time around. Like I said, the trips just get better and better each time. This was no exception. Thank you to all the guys, thank you to OCC for making this trip such a success and such a blast. From the bottom of my heart THANK YOU!. It was the best time of my life, all over again. I relived the dream. Word's cant express how truly excited and exstatic I am right now. WOW> Unbelievable. I will be back with more details, and pics will be up ASAP not to worry. Thanks so much for reading. I will probably write a full story in the coming weeks so be on the look out. Until then, enjoy this piece of literature. And the pics I will be posting soon. I am so pumped and happy. !!!



THANK YOU OCC! & PAULIE!.

ANd I just wanna extend my huge thank you to Orange County Choppers for the treatment of fans at these events. Each and every event. Even though fans are told when they go through lines they aren't allowed to get pictures with the guys, just pictures of the guys, still... The guys are gracious enough to take pictures still. And The no personalizing items when they sign rule seems to get thrown out the window as well. They will personalize if youask them to. And another note, the Black Widow, Jr's Dream Web Bike, POW/MIA Bike's were not in the showroom. Niether was the Lance Armstrong Bike. They are on the road for the upcoming roadshow. And, I just wanna tell you guys how much this particular trip meant to me. Especially my meetings with Paulie. He is my hero and idol for a reason. I identify with him on so many levels and see alot of myself in him., and for anyone who knows me, it goes further than just in the looks department. Dawn can tell you the other similarities that are uncanny. I relate to him, and I feel a bond to him that i can't explain. He treated me first class at this event, as did all the guys as usual. I felt like a part of the company, especially sitting there with Jane selling posters. They treated me like one of their own. It was more obvious this time than ever before that the guys aren't leary or frightened by me. That myth is out the window for sure now. I think now the guys get me, and they understand me. I can go on and one about this. But this may have been the best trip so far. It won't be the last one either. Many more to come. I am just on top of the world right now. I am so exstatic and excited and blessed. It's unbelievable. So in closing, THANK YOU OCC from the bottom of my heart. Once again, you've exceeded my expectations, and showed class and dignity. I am so proud to call myself the 1 occ fanatic in the world. And with that comes great responsibility lol. Again, I can't tell you enough. If you haven't had the honor to go to OCC and see and meet the guys, you must GO!!!. Your appreciation for them will go up 10 fold. There's nothing like it. You can watch them on tv until your blue in the face, but it can't compare to actually seeing and meeting them. It's incredible. And though i've been there 4 times now, each time I go it feels brand new, and it's a whole new refreshing experience. It's my happy place. It's my heaven on earth. Where I don't have a care in the world. Everyone needs a vice, or a release. For me it's OCC! . And Paul Jr. God bless OCC. See you guys in PORTLAND... I hope and pray I can make it!!... WOOHOOO... Feel free to ask me any questions you might have about my trip and experience. I welcome them. And mel, it was a blast hanging with you Saturday night/sunday morning on the steps at OCC> That's gonna be come a tradition i think. Until next time... LONG LIVE OCC!! And my fanatisism is as strong as it's ever been.