Hello and welcome to a NIGHTly News Special Edition. For the next 3 weeks, I'm going to the annual Burning Man festival in beautiful Gerlach, Nevada, United States. During my journey, I'll be detailing my day-to-day experiences in the blog. We'll be going cross-country from Oklahoma (a 3600-mile round trip, for those of you keeping track at home), so there's no guarantees that we'll be able to get connected, wifi being the random creature that it is. We'll do the best we can. Meantime, just to get this part out of the way, let's open up the floor to questions... You there, the guy being circled by flies.
"Um, yeah. I've been living under a bridge eating all the freeze-dried food I bought for the year 2000 thing and sleeping in a pile of my own feces. What the heck is Burning Man?"
Dude. It's called Bathing. Look into it.
The quick answer is that it's a big huge art festival held annually in the Black Rock Desert in northern Nevada. Around 40,000 people show up and live in a desert for a week with no vending or connection to the outside world (save for a very sporadic wifi connection). They create theme camps and other entertainments for the pure heck of it, and torch a big wooden stick figure at the end of the week. When it's over, every scrap of wood, piece of glitter, and butt of cigarette is removed, leaving the desert as blank and empty as when we came.
This, of course, is the explanation we give when we don't want to talk to people for 6 hours after we've paid the check for dinner and need to go to the bathroom real bad 'cause we had too much coffee. The real answer is WAY more complicated and involved, and is subsequently far beyond the scope of this humble blog. For the real scoop, brew up a pot of coffee (but not too much) and head over to http://www.burningman.com . Seriously, you'll be there for a while.
Okay, now you've got the quick-and-dirty version of what exactly Burning Man is. Now for more questions... you, driving the Hummer.
"So... you're, like, living in a desert for a week, right? Well, what do you do when there's nothing around you? I mean, seriously, people think it's boring here, but we have malls and Starbucks and..."
Stop talking. Now. And go get me a latte.
You have just named a big chunk of the reason people go to this thing. It's a commerce-free zone where there is no advertising permitted. There are no sponsorships or endorsement deals. Participants are encouraged to (temporarily) modify any commercial logos on their vehicles to make them weird or funny. We make our own fun without having Red Bull or Budweiser or somebody pay copious amounts of green to make it for us. The primary mode of participation is the Theme Camp, which means you set up a public area based around some sort of... well, theme. Hence the name. Some examples include Christmas Camp (free candy canes, sit on Santa's lap and make a wish) and Thunderdome Death Guild (exactly and completely like the death-battles in Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome, except with foam swords*).
While reading this blog, you may occasionally run across things that are hard to believe or seem to be pure fantasy, the ravings of a lunatic brain left on the stove to boil over, preferably with some garlic and carrots in a chicken-stock base. However, if there is one statement I will ask the Gentle Reader to indulge me in, and to believe unquestioningly, it is this one: BURNING MAN IS NOT BORING. If anything, it's a kind of sensory overload. At any given time of day, you can walk from your camp to the portapotties and see giant robots shooting fire at each other, a sixpack of recliner-sized cup cakes being driven around like go-carts, and a 30-foot-tall George W. puppet with no pants. And you can see these things while you are sober. Unlike the person asking me the next question, who appears to have just vomited in his own pants. Your question?
"Hooookay. Sho you're out in thish deshert, and you're a-buildin' a camp. Whash a kinda camp yoush guysh gonna... BLAAAARRRRRRF..."
Aww MAN! I gotta clean that up... Wait. Get the stinky guy, he won't care.
I believe the question is, what kind of a camp are we doing? And the answer would be: The Tikiplex 12. It's a hideous mutant offspring, the result of a Cinemark being forcibly sodomized by a Trader Vic's (and secretly liking it). We're going to be serving good rum drinks and watching bad movies. As I work through the details, I'll be posting information on our playlist. For example, at this moment in time, the playlist, which I am still working on, includes Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, an early Peter Jackson film called Bad Taste, and The Incredibly Strange Creatures who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies.
Speaking of the Zed-word: In spite of this being the "test year" for the Tikiplex camp concept, we're going against our own good sense and hosting a special event. The Black Rock Burner Hostel (another theme camp) is hosting the Tuesday Night Zombie Crawl. We'll dress up in Zombie drag and lurch through the city, dragging one foot and screaming for BRAAAAAAIIIIIINS. Then, everyone's coming to our camp, where they'll be served Zombies, by other Zombies, while watching movies about still other Zombies. It promises to be a grand time, so far as the longstanding Burning Man tradition of NOT bringing cricket bats remains observed this year.
Got time for one more... you, the blonde girl with the diploma.
"Hey, why are you pretending that other people are asking you questions? This is just you typing both parts and acting like it's other people. Isn't that a sign that something's really wrong with you?"
WOW! Is it really midnight? I gotta wrap this up... hey, was Stinky 2000 gonna get me the latte, or was it the guy in the Polo? Anyway... watch this space for more updates. If I know myself well enough, tomorrow should be the HolyCrapIt'sTwoWeeksUntilWeLeaveNothing'sReadyGAAAAA edition.
* A footnote about Thunderdome: Foam swords do not complete safety make. As an example, the camp displays my favorite sign ever. It says "Days since last injury: 0." It's painted like that, permanently, without even the pretense of fake numbers to flip. Beautiful, and true--it's not at all unusual to see young people carried out on stretchers after much attention from a variety of EMTs.
"Um, yeah. I've been living under a bridge eating all the freeze-dried food I bought for the year 2000 thing and sleeping in a pile of my own feces. What the heck is Burning Man?"
Dude. It's called Bathing. Look into it.
The quick answer is that it's a big huge art festival held annually in the Black Rock Desert in northern Nevada. Around 40,000 people show up and live in a desert for a week with no vending or connection to the outside world (save for a very sporadic wifi connection). They create theme camps and other entertainments for the pure heck of it, and torch a big wooden stick figure at the end of the week. When it's over, every scrap of wood, piece of glitter, and butt of cigarette is removed, leaving the desert as blank and empty as when we came.
This, of course, is the explanation we give when we don't want to talk to people for 6 hours after we've paid the check for dinner and need to go to the bathroom real bad 'cause we had too much coffee. The real answer is WAY more complicated and involved, and is subsequently far beyond the scope of this humble blog. For the real scoop, brew up a pot of coffee (but not too much) and head over to http://www.burningman.com . Seriously, you'll be there for a while.
Okay, now you've got the quick-and-dirty version of what exactly Burning Man is. Now for more questions... you, driving the Hummer.
"So... you're, like, living in a desert for a week, right? Well, what do you do when there's nothing around you? I mean, seriously, people think it's boring here, but we have malls and Starbucks and..."
Stop talking. Now. And go get me a latte.
You have just named a big chunk of the reason people go to this thing. It's a commerce-free zone where there is no advertising permitted. There are no sponsorships or endorsement deals. Participants are encouraged to (temporarily) modify any commercial logos on their vehicles to make them weird or funny. We make our own fun without having Red Bull or Budweiser or somebody pay copious amounts of green to make it for us. The primary mode of participation is the Theme Camp, which means you set up a public area based around some sort of... well, theme. Hence the name. Some examples include Christmas Camp (free candy canes, sit on Santa's lap and make a wish) and Thunderdome Death Guild (exactly and completely like the death-battles in Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome, except with foam swords*).
While reading this blog, you may occasionally run across things that are hard to believe or seem to be pure fantasy, the ravings of a lunatic brain left on the stove to boil over, preferably with some garlic and carrots in a chicken-stock base. However, if there is one statement I will ask the Gentle Reader to indulge me in, and to believe unquestioningly, it is this one: BURNING MAN IS NOT BORING. If anything, it's a kind of sensory overload. At any given time of day, you can walk from your camp to the portapotties and see giant robots shooting fire at each other, a sixpack of recliner-sized cup cakes being driven around like go-carts, and a 30-foot-tall George W. puppet with no pants. And you can see these things while you are sober. Unlike the person asking me the next question, who appears to have just vomited in his own pants. Your question?
"Hooookay. Sho you're out in thish deshert, and you're a-buildin' a camp. Whash a kinda camp yoush guysh gonna... BLAAAARRRRRRF..."
Aww MAN! I gotta clean that up... Wait. Get the stinky guy, he won't care.
I believe the question is, what kind of a camp are we doing? And the answer would be: The Tikiplex 12. It's a hideous mutant offspring, the result of a Cinemark being forcibly sodomized by a Trader Vic's (and secretly liking it). We're going to be serving good rum drinks and watching bad movies. As I work through the details, I'll be posting information on our playlist. For example, at this moment in time, the playlist, which I am still working on, includes Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, an early Peter Jackson film called Bad Taste, and The Incredibly Strange Creatures who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies.
Speaking of the Zed-word: In spite of this being the "test year" for the Tikiplex camp concept, we're going against our own good sense and hosting a special event. The Black Rock Burner Hostel (another theme camp) is hosting the Tuesday Night Zombie Crawl. We'll dress up in Zombie drag and lurch through the city, dragging one foot and screaming for BRAAAAAAIIIIIINS. Then, everyone's coming to our camp, where they'll be served Zombies, by other Zombies, while watching movies about still other Zombies. It promises to be a grand time, so far as the longstanding Burning Man tradition of NOT bringing cricket bats remains observed this year.
Got time for one more... you, the blonde girl with the diploma.
"Hey, why are you pretending that other people are asking you questions? This is just you typing both parts and acting like it's other people. Isn't that a sign that something's really wrong with you?"
WOW! Is it really midnight? I gotta wrap this up... hey, was Stinky 2000 gonna get me the latte, or was it the guy in the Polo? Anyway... watch this space for more updates. If I know myself well enough, tomorrow should be the HolyCrapIt'sTwoWeeksUntilWeLeaveNothing'sReadyGAAAAA edition.
* A footnote about Thunderdome: Foam swords do not complete safety make. As an example, the camp displays my favorite sign ever. It says "Days since last injury: 0." It's painted like that, permanently, without even the pretense of fake numbers to flip. Beautiful, and true--it's not at all unusual to see young people carried out on stretchers after much attention from a variety of EMTs.
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