2003 Ford Escape with mystery intermittent start problem

Sounds like a fuel pump to me, 2003 ford seems to be notorious in my book for this. We found our problem by having the wife stop by the dealer, after a similar story as yours, every time she went by.

In failure mode the fuel pump was diagnosed as the problem. I would recommend you try the same tactic, also recently

http://community.cartalk.com/posts/list/2155104.page