REPORT ON BURNING MAN 2007
Oct. 9th, 2007 02:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ltmurnauREPORT ON BURNING MAN 2007
Pretty linear this time, but I was feeling that way too.
GOING THERE
Saturday, August 25: Victoria BC to Salem OR
Took the 0610 ferry to Port Angeles. Someone forgot to tell the passengers to go and incriminate themselves at the little hut before they left, so they let people get on with only one inspection, not two (since something might have gotten past the first one, I suppose). Odd discussion at the border in PA – the guard was wondering why we were driving a rented cargo van and then say we were going camping. He asked, “Why Oregon, of all places?” (we had told him we were going to southern Oregon). We told him we were too cheap to rent a proper RV, and that satisfied him. Got to Salem OR by about 1500, good driving in the van with no movement of cargo – only a little squeak. Supper was a fried chicken dinner at a local family restaurant.
Sunday, August 26: Salem OR to Klamath Falls OR
Made the turnoff to go through the Cascade Mountains, just the other side of Eugene. At a rest stop 70 miles north of Klamath Falls I interviewed some folks for my “Thanks a Lot” piece for the Beacon (wherein I write about the people I’ve interviewed in parking lots headed for the Burn). Got to Klamath Falls by 1400, the room was not ready so we went to the Fred Meyer for some last-minute shopping (food, water and candy). Did several more interviews for “Thanks a Lot”. Big dinner at Sizzler, and a swim.
WHAT WE DID THERE
Monday, August 27: Klamath Falls OR to Black Rock City NV
On the road about 0900, early lunch in Alturas, made the Gate about 1500, at out campsite (9:00 Plaza at 7:45) by 1600. Set about making camp, and later printing the first edition of the Beacon for 2007 (edition size 3,000). We started about midnight and finished about 0230, just at the end of the full lunar eclipse. We were standing around congratulating each other about 0300 when someone said, “What’s that fire over there?” The Man was burning! Rumours started to fly immediately. Angie, Deb, Mitch, Lianne and I went out to the Pavilion to see what had happened, as it was apparent that we were going to have to do a special edition on this. We approached the Man and a Ranger turned us back out of the circle of lights around the pavilion. We wandered over to where the fire trucks were deployed, no one knew anything over there either. Angie and Mitch went back to camp to start laying out the special edition, Deb went to Media Mecca to get the official word, and Lianne and I went to Ranger HQ at Centre Camp to see what they had to say, that they might not have been told to say. We got nothing from them, but we did get a couple of Burner-in-the-street interviews that filled a few inches in the special edition the next day. We turned in about 0530 and got a few hours sleep before the Incan reveille music started from Tango Beso, the noisy and empty music camp 30 feet away from us.
Tuesday, August 28
Tuesday always seems to be one of the hardest days. It’s the first full day on the playa, and I still haven’t acclimatized to the heat, dryness or altitude. To add to this, I had been up all night and didn’t drink enough water. By the end of the day I was exhausted, depressed and headachey.
I stamped about 2,000 of the Special Edition papers, which had been printed on tan stock, with a “Green Edition” rubber stamp. We visited Eve at Slacktoria (a camp of other Victorians). I helped a hippy woman put her bike canopy together and met Lori Ravenstorm again, after not having seen her for six or seven years. It was her first Burn. We looked in vain for Bill at Asylum Village (we walked past his tent twice without knowing it, as it turned out). I mailed some postcards. Tuesday night we went out to look for something to do and scored a no-hitter: 80s night at Dr. Letawdrie’s Freakshow was a no-show; everyone in the Kanuckistan 2.0 dome was asleep, and no one knew where the third thing we were looking for was, whatever it was.
Wednesday August 29
I got about six hours sleep and felt 100% better. In the afternoon we went for an art-tour in the deep play on Gothalot’s art car the Blood Vessel, a modified hearse with an observation deck on top. We went all the way out by the Trash Fence and I took a lot of photos (unfortunately one whole roll did not come out). In the evening we walked to Centre Camp – I found out at the Playa Info Centre computer database just where Ethan Port (of F-SPACE and Savage Republic) and Bill lived. We went to Spike’s Vampire Bar where Spike remembered me from previous years – I gave him a “Clan of the Sink Spider” necklace. Later we ran into “Very Bad Santa”, a weird old guy who wanders the playa late at night in a Santa suit handing out small bottles of his homemade applejack. Photo I took didn’t turn out.
Thursday August 30
I got up early, had a good clean with my new bottle of Dr. Bronner’s soap (didn’t try brushing my teeth with it, as it advertises can be done), bought ice, and went to Centre Camp where I mailed postcards. I finally found Bill, who was about to conduct a get-naked-in-public-with-ease workshop, and also Ethan’s place at Struggle Tent. He and his wife Annabel were there, and he was happy to see me.
I gave him a load of F-SPACE related metal things I had cast (some gears like the Mobilization.com logo, some F-SPACE logo buttons (the I Ching hexagram means “fire”), and a bunch of Neubauten men. He had brought me some prezzies too – a hardcover edition of the Re/Search Industrial Culture Handbook reissue, some Mobilization CDs, and a DVD of an F-SPACE performance. His hope is that next summer the group can play the playa again. We walked back together to my camp as they needed ice. Lianne gave him her spare sunglasses, for his were broken. We even traded some math jokes: I found I’ve been telling that Thomas Pynchon joke wrong the whole time!
Not long after they left, an enormous whiteout hit the playa. I was fiddling with some stuff in the van when I notice the sky had gone blank and off-white. I hurriedly shut the doors and retreated to the group tent with water. Reverend Billy of the Church of Stop Shopping was in our group tent as the whiteout hit, being interviewed for the Beacon. He seemed a very wise and funny guy, so I gave him one of my Athenian-coin pins. He talked about Kurt Vonnegut and how he met an corresponded with him in his late years, and how Vonnegut approved of things like Burning Man (though it wasn’t quite the idea he had with Bokononism). The winds were about 40 mph as we were told later, more in gusts, and we all had to lean against the tent members to stop the tent from blowing in/out/over. We were in there for about three hours.
There was a further three hours of rain predicted for that night, so I was not sure about going out even as everyone else prepared to go out for a night of partying. Eventually, when it was obvious that it wasn’t going to rain (actually, it was one of the warmer nights) we went out for a walk across the playa to 3:00 Village, then along the Esplanade back to home. We saw the “Dance Dance Immolation” stage, not very interesting because the guys did not want to dance, only get shot with fire. We also saw the final stage of the resurrection of the Man, as they placed his head back on his rebuilt shoulders. We hung out in Angie’s trailer for a little bit, I went to sleep about midnight.
Friday August 31
I spent much of the day in the production van. The dust had gotten into the laser printer, so it took until 4 am to produce a first page master. Saint cleaned the rollers with contact lens cleaner after trying many other things. I was printing the flip side of 5,000 copies, but because the printer jammed every 5 copies or so it took a long time. Eventually hit on the trick of lifting the feed tray up ever so slightly to help it feed.
That took until about 1430. We were going over to see Bill again, but an even stronger windstorm hit, with winds of up to 60 mph. That was the end of that – we had to grope our way back from the latrines, you literally could not see more than four or five feet. We got into the group tent again and tried to stop it flying away. The production tent started to come apart, so we took it down with the printer and computer still inside. The storm was over about 5:30, Gothalot was supposed to get married at 6:00 so I put on my best Red Guard outfit. But because of the dust, it was postponed to the next day.
After kitting out for night time, we went on a trip on Gothalot’s enormous hearse and trailer “Blood Vessel”. We drove out to the deep playa and stopped at some pyramid-like structure that was to be burnt about 2200. There were fire dancers, including a guy who had two flaming bullwhips he kept cracking. They ignited the structure with propane-tank flamethrowers and as it caught fire, dust devils filled with ash and sparks whirled out of the fire toward us. We rode back home and I went to bed, very tired, at 2330.
Saturday September 1
Got up at 0700 or so, at the beginning of what was to be a 40 hour stretch with almost no sleep. Finished packing up the production tent after pulling out the computer, printer and tables. Loaded the printer into the production van – that night we would lay out the paper in the laptop in Angie’s trailer, print a master on the printer in the van, and finish printing there as well.
Just as I finished packing up the production tent in its duffel bag Bill came by for a quick visit, then I walked him back to his camp. I left him as he was about to prepare a tutorial on fellatio. Later I took down our pup tent (which we had used for gear and storage) and prepared to load the stuff into the van for a quick getaway on Sunday morning. At 1700 we had a Beacon Council meeting, that is the AGM, in Gothalot’s pavilion across the way from that bloody Tango Beso dome. At the end it was about 1830 and just time for a can of Chef Boy-ar-dee (as I ate for many meals that week) for supper before it got dark. Lianne and I watched the Burn from 9:00 and Esplanade, sitting against a big wooden duck festooned with strips of cloth on which people had written wishes and hopes. There was a Fire Service truck beside us with two very nice guys we talked with. The professionalism and maturity of these people, and the Rangers I’ve met, on what amounts to an unpaid non-vacation from their regular work always impresses me. We didn’t want to get into the crowd, which was probably 40,000 strong by then (the city population was up to 47,000 by Saturday night) so we saw the top half of everything. The rebuilt Man burned well and took a long time to finally collapse.
An hour or two later we got a ride on Howeird’s taxi to see the final act of “Crude Awakening”, the most impressive piece of art I saw out there this year. The piece was created by the same team of sculptors who did “Procession” (the mother and child piece) in 2005, and the three-figure installation in front of Centre Camp in 2006. This one was out on the deep playa, and was seven human figures, 25 or 30 feet tall, made out of pieces of scrap metal and chain, in positions of worship and reverence in front of a 100 foot wooden oil derrick.
Two hours after the Man burned, the piece was destroyed in a very impressive show. The Mutaytor, sometimes known as “the Burning Man house band”, played a set then announced the beginning of the performance. A smoke generator unit said to be off an old battleship (gee, is there any other kind) laid down a huge cloud of smoke while an air-raid siren tone rose and fell very several minutes. Very eerie. Then “The Star-Spangled Banner played, normally at first then it became discordant and distorted. Fireworks began to shoot off of and around the derrick, lots of popping and tracer-like ones that to me recalled the film I had seen of the AAA barrages over Baghdad in the first Gulf War. This went on for a while as the music got ever stranger and more discordant, then a moment’s pause and what was supposed to be the largest flame cannon in the world exploded a huge fireball that set the derrick alight. It continued to burn for quite a while, silhouetting the metal figures very impressively. In due course it collapsed but the flames were still very high.
This was the impressive Art Moment I had hoped to get out of this Burn. I had all week been feeling variously out of place (at least with the hedonist, partying side of Burning Man) and especially bad and depressed that night. I felt this was all just a big fake and a put-on, for in a few days 95% of these people would be back at their day jobs or studying Business Administration or whatever without their being there having made any difference, and angry at myself for being 42 and still doing things like this. But it was something about this, something about things like this, that make me think it is worth going back.
We went back in Howeird’s taxi and waited for the paper to finish layout as soon as Taymar and WeeGee got back with their photos of the burning things. Saint and I set up the laser printer and ran some test pages, to see if the extreme dust of the last two days had affected it. About 0230 I went back to the van and grabbed about an hour’s sleep. It wasn’t until well after 0400 that I and WeeGee and Deb could start printing – something had gone funny with the laser printer and it crumpled up the bottom 2-3 inches of whatever master it was given to print. WeeGee left after a bit and together Deb and I printed about 2500 copies of the final edition. About 0730 Deb got some rest and I carried on with Dave-the-Intern, printing one side of another 1,000 copies. At 0900 I woke Lianne (who had gone to bed about 0500) and prepared to deflate and fold up the bed, close kitbags, load tubs and jugs and otherwise prepare the cabin for departure. Some quick goodbyes and by 1045 we were in the lineup for Exodus. We never quite stopped moving and by about 1230 we were clear of the Gate and headed for Klamath Falls. The 2007 Burn was over for us, save for the getting back home. I slept that night about 2300.
COMING BACK
Oh, go back to the “Going There” section and read it backwards. At Port Angeles, waiting to take the ferry back home, the Customs guard remembered us from ten days before (as “those weirdo Canadian cheapskates”, I’m sure) and asked us how our camping trip went.
NOTES FOR NEXT TIME, ETC.
I definitely need to be more physically fit. I think the sad and angry times I alluded to in the narrative were perhaps more due to being exhausted than anything else (though this year has not been an easy one emotionally).
I need to set and keep boundaries – I am not responsible for anyone else’s experience, nor are they for mine. I also don't need to work so hard (though I feel very responsible about it). Don’t take it personally. Drink water. And so on.
Camp:
The cargo van was one of our best arrangements yet, in terms of both vehicle and comfort (last year’s camper was good for comfort, but the pickup truck was straining to do the job and wasn’t easy to drive). It drove well, had lots of power and best of all a 30 gallon gas tank so we weren’t worried about running out.
Though I did not put one together, and the dust storms would have ripped it apart, an awning for the entrance would still be a good idea.
The auxiliary pup tent for storage was a good idea, but the stuff inside should be kept in plastic tubs with covers. The dust storms drove a lot of dust into the tent regardless of how zipped up I kept it.
DON’T CAMP NEXT TO A BUNCH OF LAZY NOISY ARSEHOLES FROM IOWA WITH A 300 WATT SOUND SYSTEM THEY KEEP BLARING AT ALL HOURS OF THE DAY AND NIGHT REGARDLESS OF WHETHER ANYONE IS IN THEIR STUPID GIANT DOME (WHICH THEY BUILT USING THEIR NEIGHBOURS’ LABOUR) OR NOT.
Food:
Minimize perishables – eat in the first two days or don’t carry them at all.
More Gatorade/Powerade/vitamin drinks.
Also more Emergen-C, and Crystal Light to add to water.
Equipment:
The big big Ziploc laundry bags were a good idea for keeping things clean.
Ditto were “coming-and-going packs”, for road clothes and outside-BRC things can be kept sealed and clean (and you don’t have to root around for stuff when at the end of the driving day).
The three-drawer thingies were good for keeping food and small things organized – we could pack them before leaving and just bungee them shut.
I brought the Pantzooka again, but, like last year, no Donald Ducks were to be seen. Poor Francis was helping me test-fire it and the charging handle came out and dropped on his bare foot (moments after this picture was taken).
Things I wrote for the Beacon:
“Burner in the Street” – Interviewed some people on their reactions to the Man burning early (about 0430, only an hour or so after he was burned). Tuesday special edition.
“Thanks a Lot” – I accosted people who were obviously Burners in parking lots on the way to the event, asking them about what they were bringing to the event, anything special they were going to do, etc.. Wednesday edition.
“I Asked Dr. Hal” – I interviewed the legendary Hal Robins by email. Unfortunately, due to the completely useless event guide, I had no idea where and when I could find him (he MCs the annual fashion show at Centre Camp, but who knew when that was going on…I may yet meet him.). Friday edition.
“Remembrance of Gazettes Past” – I looked through Black Rock Gazettes from 1996 (the ones form 1997 were not online) and wrote up what got featured then. Did not run.
“Playa Math” – Did not run.
New Face:
A few years ago I hired a co-op student to work in my office. She came out for her first Burn this year, and came to visit the Beacon - here she is looking very happy with Taymar, our star photographer:
Pretty linear this time, but I was feeling that way too.
GOING THERE
Saturday, August 25: Victoria BC to Salem OR
Took the 0610 ferry to Port Angeles. Someone forgot to tell the passengers to go and incriminate themselves at the little hut before they left, so they let people get on with only one inspection, not two (since something might have gotten past the first one, I suppose). Odd discussion at the border in PA – the guard was wondering why we were driving a rented cargo van and then say we were going camping. He asked, “Why Oregon, of all places?” (we had told him we were going to southern Oregon). We told him we were too cheap to rent a proper RV, and that satisfied him. Got to Salem OR by about 1500, good driving in the van with no movement of cargo – only a little squeak. Supper was a fried chicken dinner at a local family restaurant.
Sunday, August 26: Salem OR to Klamath Falls OR
Made the turnoff to go through the Cascade Mountains, just the other side of Eugene. At a rest stop 70 miles north of Klamath Falls I interviewed some folks for my “Thanks a Lot” piece for the Beacon (wherein I write about the people I’ve interviewed in parking lots headed for the Burn). Got to Klamath Falls by 1400, the room was not ready so we went to the Fred Meyer for some last-minute shopping (food, water and candy). Did several more interviews for “Thanks a Lot”. Big dinner at Sizzler, and a swim.
WHAT WE DID THERE
Monday, August 27: Klamath Falls OR to Black Rock City NV
On the road about 0900, early lunch in Alturas, made the Gate about 1500, at out campsite (9:00 Plaza at 7:45) by 1600. Set about making camp, and later printing the first edition of the Beacon for 2007 (edition size 3,000). We started about midnight and finished about 0230, just at the end of the full lunar eclipse. We were standing around congratulating each other about 0300 when someone said, “What’s that fire over there?” The Man was burning! Rumours started to fly immediately. Angie, Deb, Mitch, Lianne and I went out to the Pavilion to see what had happened, as it was apparent that we were going to have to do a special edition on this. We approached the Man and a Ranger turned us back out of the circle of lights around the pavilion. We wandered over to where the fire trucks were deployed, no one knew anything over there either. Angie and Mitch went back to camp to start laying out the special edition, Deb went to Media Mecca to get the official word, and Lianne and I went to Ranger HQ at Centre Camp to see what they had to say, that they might not have been told to say. We got nothing from them, but we did get a couple of Burner-in-the-street interviews that filled a few inches in the special edition the next day. We turned in about 0530 and got a few hours sleep before the Incan reveille music started from Tango Beso, the noisy and empty music camp 30 feet away from us.
Tuesday, August 28
Tuesday always seems to be one of the hardest days. It’s the first full day on the playa, and I still haven’t acclimatized to the heat, dryness or altitude. To add to this, I had been up all night and didn’t drink enough water. By the end of the day I was exhausted, depressed and headachey.
I stamped about 2,000 of the Special Edition papers, which had been printed on tan stock, with a “Green Edition” rubber stamp. We visited Eve at Slacktoria (a camp of other Victorians). I helped a hippy woman put her bike canopy together and met Lori Ravenstorm again, after not having seen her for six or seven years. It was her first Burn. We looked in vain for Bill at Asylum Village (we walked past his tent twice without knowing it, as it turned out). I mailed some postcards. Tuesday night we went out to look for something to do and scored a no-hitter: 80s night at Dr. Letawdrie’s Freakshow was a no-show; everyone in the Kanuckistan 2.0 dome was asleep, and no one knew where the third thing we were looking for was, whatever it was.
Wednesday August 29
I got about six hours sleep and felt 100% better. In the afternoon we went for an art-tour in the deep play on Gothalot’s art car the Blood Vessel, a modified hearse with an observation deck on top. We went all the way out by the Trash Fence and I took a lot of photos (unfortunately one whole roll did not come out). In the evening we walked to Centre Camp – I found out at the Playa Info Centre computer database just where Ethan Port (of F-SPACE and Savage Republic) and Bill lived. We went to Spike’s Vampire Bar where Spike remembered me from previous years – I gave him a “Clan of the Sink Spider” necklace. Later we ran into “Very Bad Santa”, a weird old guy who wanders the playa late at night in a Santa suit handing out small bottles of his homemade applejack. Photo I took didn’t turn out.
Thursday August 30
I got up early, had a good clean with my new bottle of Dr. Bronner’s soap (didn’t try brushing my teeth with it, as it advertises can be done), bought ice, and went to Centre Camp where I mailed postcards. I finally found Bill, who was about to conduct a get-naked-in-public-with-ease workshop, and also Ethan’s place at Struggle Tent. He and his wife Annabel were there, and he was happy to see me.
I gave him a load of F-SPACE related metal things I had cast (some gears like the Mobilization.com logo, some F-SPACE logo buttons (the I Ching hexagram means “fire”), and a bunch of Neubauten men. He had brought me some prezzies too – a hardcover edition of the Re/Search Industrial Culture Handbook reissue, some Mobilization CDs, and a DVD of an F-SPACE performance. His hope is that next summer the group can play the playa again. We walked back together to my camp as they needed ice. Lianne gave him her spare sunglasses, for his were broken. We even traded some math jokes: I found I’ve been telling that Thomas Pynchon joke wrong the whole time!
Not long after they left, an enormous whiteout hit the playa. I was fiddling with some stuff in the van when I notice the sky had gone blank and off-white. I hurriedly shut the doors and retreated to the group tent with water. Reverend Billy of the Church of Stop Shopping was in our group tent as the whiteout hit, being interviewed for the Beacon. He seemed a very wise and funny guy, so I gave him one of my Athenian-coin pins. He talked about Kurt Vonnegut and how he met an corresponded with him in his late years, and how Vonnegut approved of things like Burning Man (though it wasn’t quite the idea he had with Bokononism). The winds were about 40 mph as we were told later, more in gusts, and we all had to lean against the tent members to stop the tent from blowing in/out/over. We were in there for about three hours.
There was a further three hours of rain predicted for that night, so I was not sure about going out even as everyone else prepared to go out for a night of partying. Eventually, when it was obvious that it wasn’t going to rain (actually, it was one of the warmer nights) we went out for a walk across the playa to 3:00 Village, then along the Esplanade back to home. We saw the “Dance Dance Immolation” stage, not very interesting because the guys did not want to dance, only get shot with fire. We also saw the final stage of the resurrection of the Man, as they placed his head back on his rebuilt shoulders. We hung out in Angie’s trailer for a little bit, I went to sleep about midnight.
Friday August 31
I spent much of the day in the production van. The dust had gotten into the laser printer, so it took until 4 am to produce a first page master. Saint cleaned the rollers with contact lens cleaner after trying many other things. I was printing the flip side of 5,000 copies, but because the printer jammed every 5 copies or so it took a long time. Eventually hit on the trick of lifting the feed tray up ever so slightly to help it feed.
That took until about 1430. We were going over to see Bill again, but an even stronger windstorm hit, with winds of up to 60 mph. That was the end of that – we had to grope our way back from the latrines, you literally could not see more than four or five feet. We got into the group tent again and tried to stop it flying away. The production tent started to come apart, so we took it down with the printer and computer still inside. The storm was over about 5:30, Gothalot was supposed to get married at 6:00 so I put on my best Red Guard outfit. But because of the dust, it was postponed to the next day.
After kitting out for night time, we went on a trip on Gothalot’s enormous hearse and trailer “Blood Vessel”. We drove out to the deep playa and stopped at some pyramid-like structure that was to be burnt about 2200. There were fire dancers, including a guy who had two flaming bullwhips he kept cracking. They ignited the structure with propane-tank flamethrowers and as it caught fire, dust devils filled with ash and sparks whirled out of the fire toward us. We rode back home and I went to bed, very tired, at 2330.
Saturday September 1
Got up at 0700 or so, at the beginning of what was to be a 40 hour stretch with almost no sleep. Finished packing up the production tent after pulling out the computer, printer and tables. Loaded the printer into the production van – that night we would lay out the paper in the laptop in Angie’s trailer, print a master on the printer in the van, and finish printing there as well.
Just as I finished packing up the production tent in its duffel bag Bill came by for a quick visit, then I walked him back to his camp. I left him as he was about to prepare a tutorial on fellatio. Later I took down our pup tent (which we had used for gear and storage) and prepared to load the stuff into the van for a quick getaway on Sunday morning. At 1700 we had a Beacon Council meeting, that is the AGM, in Gothalot’s pavilion across the way from that bloody Tango Beso dome. At the end it was about 1830 and just time for a can of Chef Boy-ar-dee (as I ate for many meals that week) for supper before it got dark. Lianne and I watched the Burn from 9:00 and Esplanade, sitting against a big wooden duck festooned with strips of cloth on which people had written wishes and hopes. There was a Fire Service truck beside us with two very nice guys we talked with. The professionalism and maturity of these people, and the Rangers I’ve met, on what amounts to an unpaid non-vacation from their regular work always impresses me. We didn’t want to get into the crowd, which was probably 40,000 strong by then (the city population was up to 47,000 by Saturday night) so we saw the top half of everything. The rebuilt Man burned well and took a long time to finally collapse.
An hour or two later we got a ride on Howeird’s taxi to see the final act of “Crude Awakening”, the most impressive piece of art I saw out there this year. The piece was created by the same team of sculptors who did “Procession” (the mother and child piece) in 2005, and the three-figure installation in front of Centre Camp in 2006. This one was out on the deep playa, and was seven human figures, 25 or 30 feet tall, made out of pieces of scrap metal and chain, in positions of worship and reverence in front of a 100 foot wooden oil derrick.
Two hours after the Man burned, the piece was destroyed in a very impressive show. The Mutaytor, sometimes known as “the Burning Man house band”, played a set then announced the beginning of the performance. A smoke generator unit said to be off an old battleship (gee, is there any other kind) laid down a huge cloud of smoke while an air-raid siren tone rose and fell very several minutes. Very eerie. Then “The Star-Spangled Banner played, normally at first then it became discordant and distorted. Fireworks began to shoot off of and around the derrick, lots of popping and tracer-like ones that to me recalled the film I had seen of the AAA barrages over Baghdad in the first Gulf War. This went on for a while as the music got ever stranger and more discordant, then a moment’s pause and what was supposed to be the largest flame cannon in the world exploded a huge fireball that set the derrick alight. It continued to burn for quite a while, silhouetting the metal figures very impressively. In due course it collapsed but the flames were still very high.
This was the impressive Art Moment I had hoped to get out of this Burn. I had all week been feeling variously out of place (at least with the hedonist, partying side of Burning Man) and especially bad and depressed that night. I felt this was all just a big fake and a put-on, for in a few days 95% of these people would be back at their day jobs or studying Business Administration or whatever without their being there having made any difference, and angry at myself for being 42 and still doing things like this. But it was something about this, something about things like this, that make me think it is worth going back.
We went back in Howeird’s taxi and waited for the paper to finish layout as soon as Taymar and WeeGee got back with their photos of the burning things. Saint and I set up the laser printer and ran some test pages, to see if the extreme dust of the last two days had affected it. About 0230 I went back to the van and grabbed about an hour’s sleep. It wasn’t until well after 0400 that I and WeeGee and Deb could start printing – something had gone funny with the laser printer and it crumpled up the bottom 2-3 inches of whatever master it was given to print. WeeGee left after a bit and together Deb and I printed about 2500 copies of the final edition. About 0730 Deb got some rest and I carried on with Dave-the-Intern, printing one side of another 1,000 copies. At 0900 I woke Lianne (who had gone to bed about 0500) and prepared to deflate and fold up the bed, close kitbags, load tubs and jugs and otherwise prepare the cabin for departure. Some quick goodbyes and by 1045 we were in the lineup for Exodus. We never quite stopped moving and by about 1230 we were clear of the Gate and headed for Klamath Falls. The 2007 Burn was over for us, save for the getting back home. I slept that night about 2300.
COMING BACK
Oh, go back to the “Going There” section and read it backwards. At Port Angeles, waiting to take the ferry back home, the Customs guard remembered us from ten days before (as “those weirdo Canadian cheapskates”, I’m sure) and asked us how our camping trip went.
NOTES FOR NEXT TIME, ETC.
I definitely need to be more physically fit. I think the sad and angry times I alluded to in the narrative were perhaps more due to being exhausted than anything else (though this year has not been an easy one emotionally).
I need to set and keep boundaries – I am not responsible for anyone else’s experience, nor are they for mine. I also don't need to work so hard (though I feel very responsible about it). Don’t take it personally. Drink water. And so on.
Camp:
The cargo van was one of our best arrangements yet, in terms of both vehicle and comfort (last year’s camper was good for comfort, but the pickup truck was straining to do the job and wasn’t easy to drive). It drove well, had lots of power and best of all a 30 gallon gas tank so we weren’t worried about running out.
Though I did not put one together, and the dust storms would have ripped it apart, an awning for the entrance would still be a good idea.
The auxiliary pup tent for storage was a good idea, but the stuff inside should be kept in plastic tubs with covers. The dust storms drove a lot of dust into the tent regardless of how zipped up I kept it.
DON’T CAMP NEXT TO A BUNCH OF LAZY NOISY ARSEHOLES FROM IOWA WITH A 300 WATT SOUND SYSTEM THEY KEEP BLARING AT ALL HOURS OF THE DAY AND NIGHT REGARDLESS OF WHETHER ANYONE IS IN THEIR STUPID GIANT DOME (WHICH THEY BUILT USING THEIR NEIGHBOURS’ LABOUR) OR NOT.
Food:
Minimize perishables – eat in the first two days or don’t carry them at all.
More Gatorade/Powerade/vitamin drinks.
Also more Emergen-C, and Crystal Light to add to water.
Equipment:
The big big Ziploc laundry bags were a good idea for keeping things clean.
Ditto were “coming-and-going packs”, for road clothes and outside-BRC things can be kept sealed and clean (and you don’t have to root around for stuff when at the end of the driving day).
The three-drawer thingies were good for keeping food and small things organized – we could pack them before leaving and just bungee them shut.
I brought the Pantzooka again, but, like last year, no Donald Ducks were to be seen. Poor Francis was helping me test-fire it and the charging handle came out and dropped on his bare foot (moments after this picture was taken).
Things I wrote for the Beacon:
“Burner in the Street” – Interviewed some people on their reactions to the Man burning early (about 0430, only an hour or so after he was burned). Tuesday special edition.
“Thanks a Lot” – I accosted people who were obviously Burners in parking lots on the way to the event, asking them about what they were bringing to the event, anything special they were going to do, etc.. Wednesday edition.
“I Asked Dr. Hal” – I interviewed the legendary Hal Robins by email. Unfortunately, due to the completely useless event guide, I had no idea where and when I could find him (he MCs the annual fashion show at Centre Camp, but who knew when that was going on…I may yet meet him.). Friday edition.
“Remembrance of Gazettes Past” – I looked through Black Rock Gazettes from 1996 (the ones form 1997 were not online) and wrote up what got featured then. Did not run.
“Playa Math” – Did not run.
New Face:
A few years ago I hired a co-op student to work in my office. She came out for her first Burn this year, and came to visit the Beacon - here she is looking very happy with Taymar, our star photographer:
