There is something oddly disconcerting about riding around in a car that makes no noise.

There is something downright unnerving when the grandfatherly fellow driving, who bears more than a striking resemblance to jolly old St. Nick after gastric-bypass surgery, is grinning like the Cheshire Cat as he mashes the accelerator to the floor and the turkey Reuben you had for lunch is having serious misgivings about coming along for the ride.

And the fact that there's no shift-lag at all since the single-gear transmission requires no clutch, manual or automatic, is just downright weird.

The cherubic maniac sitting next to me and piloting this missile is Dr. Gerald McNichols, better known as Mac. He and his wife moved to Middleburg in 1995, out from the D.C. area where they'd lived since 1967.

"We both absolutely love it out here," said Mac. "The people, the country, the pace. We can still get inside the beltway when we want to, but Middleburg is a wonderful place to call home."

McNichols' story is a fine one, make no mistake about it; he was commissioned by the Air Force in 1965 and spent four years on the Air Staff before joining the Office of the Secretary of Defense for five years; he co-authored the textbook Operations Research in Decision Making; he's been an adjunct professor at George Mason University and The George Washington University as well as a guest lecturer at University of Maryland and American University; he's founded, built, bought and sold more companies than most of us have worked for; he's served on boards, committees and commissions; he's an angel investor and philanthropist and currently spends much of his time helping new and interesting companies get their legs under them.

But this is really a story about the car. Cool as Mac is, the car may be even cooler. It's a Tesla, it's the first of its kind in Virginia, and, if it weren't such an eye-catcher, this whisper quiet, Racing Green Roadster might just sneak up on you.

One of the first things you notice when you walk around the Tesla Roadster, other than the fact that the front windshield comes up only to about your waist, other than the appearance that its two seats are sitting right on the ground, and after you've picked your jaw up off your chest at seeing one of the rarest cars in the country (only about 500 have been built and sold to date), is that there's no tailpipe protruding from the rear of the car. That's because the car doesn't use gas. At all. Not a drop.

The Roadster, as well as the Roadster Sport, the Roadster II, and the upcoming Model S sedan, all run on a microprocessor-controlled lithium-ion battery. The Roadster's battery, comprised of 6,831 individual cells, weighs in at a whopping 992 lbs. That battery, though, gives the Roadster an EPA-estimated range of about 220 miles per charge. As recently as April of this year, a Roadster set a new record at the Rallye Monte Carlo d'Energies Alternatives, completing the 241 mile course with a reported 31 miles of range left.

On top of that, Tesla claims the battery is good for five years or 100,000 miles. And, using the High Power Connector to charge up (it plugs into the same type of outlet you'd use for a clothes dryer), the battery is fully juiced in about 3.5 hours. Tesla Motors claims the operational cost per mile to be about $0.01. Yup, a penny. That's more than five times better than a Prius, based on mileage estimates.

All of which is swell. But how does it drive?!

Like a rocket.

Once you get yourself folded into the cockpit, something I'm guessing gets easier with practice and muscle-flexibility, you turn the key and hear… nothing. Well, there's a chime, but other than that? The thing is just on. You push a button to get into gear (there's nothing even approximating a stick), press the accelerator, and the car just glides forward. Or backwards, if you prefer. Power steering is not an option, but the wheel turns freely without too much wrenching and fighting. Driving around town is a fine, but where you really want to be is out on the open road. The battery's weight sits pretty close to the center of the car, and when you combine that with a very low stance (did I mention sitting on the ground?) You get a ride that handles like a true sports car, dipping and diving into turns, gobbling up asphalt and blowing the doors off just about anything else on the road.

Because of the Roadster's electric power plant, all the torque generated by the engine is available from 0 RPM all the way to 6000 RPM, with plenty left over all the way to 14,000 RPM. The Roadster goes from 0-60 mph in under 4 seconds. That I can personally attest to.

All in all, the Roadster's a hoot. Its north-of-$100,000 price-tag is prohibitive, no doubt about it, but the technology behind it is the real deal, and the Model S sedan that's coming out next will be priced around a more-reasonable $57,000. Tack on Federal income tax credits, single person access to HOV lanes, and that operational cost, and you suddenly see the Tesla Roadster for what it just might really be: a glimpse of the future.

If you see Mac tooling around town in his Roadster, give him a wave. He'll happily wave back.

But keep your eyes peeled.