Destination Burning Man Blog

...and we introduced ourselves and our secret superhero identities, and then dove in to working on the playa plan -- more on that later. Here's some of the folks that have come together to construct the Boogie Pyramid, along with shots of DJ Edubious, Hekter and DJ Playaduster getting ready for the Green Man:




Link to our Flickr page here.

I wanted to let you know of an event that I am producing in SF next weekend and over the summer called Prepare for the Playa. It is a series of events connecting people to everything they need for the playa and Burn -07! It is brought to you by all burner indie businesses! We have come together in a co-op marketing vein to give people an alternative to shopping their local Wal-Mart. Our motto - Buy Local for BM... Buy Burner!

We are going to have performing artists, live music, the bar will be open and of course the most outrageous fashions, faux fur galore, domes, lights, playa furniture, and tons more! There is also going to be how to clinic covering such topics as grey water, nutrician on the playa and a first timers interactive guide. I would love to see you guys come out and hang with us or even participate in some way! Heck, if you could post something on your blog that would be awesome and very much appreciated!

More details on our website: http://www.preparefortheplaya.com
June 10th, July 22nd and August 12th

Thanks so much for your consideration!
See you on the playa or sooner!
Nikki
preparefortheplaya@gmail.com

Here's an amazing hand-drawn map of Black Rock City 2005 by Lisa Hoffman.



and here's a map of Black Rock City 2006: Hope and Fear done in "Acid Deco" style.

I found both via the website info gargoyle. The guy who wrote the posts is very serious about his cartography -- it is the gift that he brings to the community: "This year, I'm seeing more and more people come together with their interest in cartography than ever before. The sponsored mapping group, PlayaInfo is also expanding their geographic reach by supporting a GPSDrive friendsd server so that participants with art cars can broadcast their location to the main map. Seems like a perfect fit for cyborgs and technomads alike!"

He's got an interesting slideshow too right over here.

As for your plans for the playa...well, y'all theme campers best get your games on, because MAY 31st is the new theme camp/placement deadline -- and that's EARLIER than previous years, but the placement team needs the time to make all your amazing theme-campy-pieces fit, which is harder than it sounds! We know you've got big plans - now's the time to get them organized and submitted to the team that'll put it all together to make one big, bouncing BRC. Don't procrastinate. Remember also, the Art, Media, DMV questionnaires are all still humming along, and have deadlines of their own. Get on it: http://forms.burningman.com/Good advice heard on the NY list this week: now's a good time to take out your tent and test it for the season...missing poles and ripped eyelets still have plenty of time to be replaced or repaired!Off we go.Eeeeeeeeeeep!
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
PARTICIPATE:
ARTISTS, INVENTORS: EXHIBIT AT THE GREEN MAN PAVILION!EMERGENCY SERVICES SEEKS VOLUNTEER DISPATCHERSRECYCLE YOUR PLAYA PROJECT INTO THE ADVENTURE PLAYGROUND!KNITTERS/CROCHETERS - CONTRIBUTE TO CREATING A PLAYA SCULPTURE!SAN FRANCISCO ANNOUNCE LIST - SIGN UP NOW!ARTIST SEEKS MARKETING "FAUX CREDIT CARDS" FOR ART PROJECT!SUPPORT THE SAPPHIRE PORTAL: SAPPHIRE PORTAL PENDANTSPHOTOGRAPHER SEEKS LOS ANGELES FIRE ARTIST
REGIONAL EVENTS:
9th ANNUAL UTAH REGIONAL BURN - ELEMENT 11 - JUNE 1-3APOGAEA - COLORADO REGIONAL BURN JUNE 7-10 - FRONT RANGE, COLORADOSOUTHBAY PRE-COMPRESSION WEEKEND JUNE 9-10 SANTA CRUZ MOUNTAINSSCORCHED NUTS - OHIO REGIONAL BURN - JUNE 14-17NOWHERE - THE EUROPE REGIONAL BURN JUL 4-8 SPAIN: 10 DAYS LEFT FOR CHEAPTIX!
EVENTS AND HAPPENINGS:
BLACK ROCK RENDEZVOUS MAY 26-28 BLACK ROCK DESERTGREENING YOUR BURN/LNT TRAIN THE TRAINER BACKPACKING TRIP JUNE 9-10EDEN'S MASQUERADE - FUNDRAISER FOR PLAYA ART - SAVE DATE JUNE 8, NYCCOSTUMES AND CULTURE AT BURNING MAN: NEVADA MUSEUM OF ART JULY 14 - NOV 11
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Of course this year, new "Green Man" ideas to help us all reduce, reuse, recycle, rethink, and repair WHILE we prepare are *especially* welcome! Got info on pick yards, scrap warehouses, sources for used stuff? Hit us up! Note: If you have preparation ideas that DON'T relate to buying or selling, but DO encourage reuse/repair/rethinking tips, please send those in ANYTIME and we'll share 'em any way we can. The RESOURCE issue is the place to share info about those things that many of us have yet to acquire in preparation for the week of surviving in the desert...but let's all do this with an eye toward making greener, better decisions this year!

I also bought a nice BBQ that, as long as we have room in the truck, I'd be happy to bring down for camp use.

I think this purchase pretty much covers camp fees for Chelsea and I. I really hope that I'll be able to recoup at least some of the $1,200 + tax I invested in the camp today. I've heard a couple of people mention they're ready to pay their camp fees. If you're one of those people, you can either call me and set up a time to meet or
drop off some money, or you can mail me a check or sign into paypal and send it from your bank account.

If you have any questions about camp fees, how they work, or what you think would be a fair contribution, please feel free to contact me directly or inquire on this list.

For those on a budget, the idea of giving $200 or so might seem a bit daunting. Regardless of what amount you decide to give, you don't have to pay it all at once. We've got just over three months 'till Burning Man. You could send $100/month, or $50/mo., or $15/wk, or whatever works for you. I'll keep a spreadsheet going of what everyone contributes as well as monitor our budget & spending. I will keep your contribution amounts private unless you want to brag about how generous you are.


Here's what our crew is starting to look like as far as I can tell:

Absolutely for sure you bet your mama I'm gonna camp w/BU:

Erik
Chelsea
Christian
edub
Michael

Pretty darn sure, but not yet totally baptized in BU playa dust:

Carla (90% sure, she said today)
Anneke & Chris
Luke & Friend
Wendy
Sasha

BM-curious, who knows... :

Marcus Curlee
Jim Duval
Amy HD
Freewill
Rashaan
Dave (Discophile)
David
Donna
Brock
Hans Swensen
Jeny & Brian
Jeremy & Stephanie
Libby
Mitch

If you're on the wrong list here or know someone that should be on there, please let me know. I'm quite sure we'll see this list grow a bit in the near future

As for the pyramid, I'm a little nervous. I still haven't ordered the fabric, though I think I will on Monday. I haven't found the perfect glue still. I worry about that even if I find what seems like the perfect glue, would it hold up under the heat of the desert? I'm starting to re-explore the idea of sewing. I don't like the idea much, but it might be the reality if we do this thing. I really don't even know what kind of time frame or amount of labor such a task would be, but quite possibly more than is realistic.

I just worry that even if we make the seams wrapped up around the cable in such a way that it can't move too much, it might still unravel in the heat & wind and end up flapping itself to death in no time.

Any thoughts, ideas?

We need some people to step up and nominate themselves/volunteer to be leads.

Here are the leads that come to mind:

BORG application person (the person that files for our placement & registration etc.) I'm willing to do most of this, but if you look at this link you can learn more about it if you might help: http://forms.burningman.com/aiq2k7

Meal Plan/Kitchen duty organizer (pretty simple really, someone to figure out how many meals we need (breakfast & dinner only) and how many camp members we have, then get people to sign up for specific days/times) If we all agree to do a meal plan, we'll each probably have to cook one or two meals for the whole group out of the entire week, then all of our remaining breakfasts & dinners will be made for us---it's a very, very, nice way to go.

LNT (leave no trace) co-ordinator,

Safety Third (aka re-bar safety coordinator)

Fund raising lead

Camp layout designer (we need this asap to submit w/our plans)

Rental truck drivers (Chelsea & I volunteer for this)

Rental truck loaders/unloaders

People that want to be on the early arrival/set-up list (get in Fri
or sat)

Talent organizer/booker/scheduler

Party planner (for our on-playa party night/nigths)

Artistic Visionary

Any other roles, ideas, whatever.....

Oh, and a couple of people that are on the fence about joining the camp mentioned they were affraid they wouldn't be around Bellingham to help out to build stuff. This doesn't mean you can't be apart of the camp.

There are countless ways to participate and contribute and be a part of this thing.

Even if you have other on-playa projects pre-event time restraints or whatever, we'd still like to have you a part of our crew. We're a pretty welcoming bunch.

Ok, enough outta me.

Cheers,

Erik

Found this unofficial icon on Flickr in the Green Man 2007 pool

I've got a quote on the freight & materials for the fabric: 30 14' x 48' mega heavy duty tarps, $40 each = $1,200 + the best deal I could find for freight is $425 (they weigh a ton, literally). $1,625 for our running total.

At this point we have $2,000 to work with. We still have to get cables, the mast, some sort of come-along/crank/pullie system, the mast, and some heavy duty stakes. I'm not too worried if we go a little over budget, I'm sure some money will fall from the sky if we need it to (aka the BU credit card). If this thing works it will be a good investment (if not financiall at least in the sense of empowering good people to do silly things).

....wow, that could be a new Boogie Universal slogan: "Empowering good people to do Silly Things...."

I'm waiting to hear back from Ron about the welding and mast building.

I'm also pricing cable. If anyone happens to know a good place for such or sees anything on craigslist or anything, we need about 1,500 feet of 1/4" vinyl coated galvanized or stainless steel cable and about 180 feet of 3/8", 1/2", or 5/8" for the corners. While I'm at it, if anyone has about 36 feet of 6" diameter steel pipe....

We could forseeably have all of this stuff within a week. I think our first work party will probably be not this Sunday, but the next one. I'll keep you posted.

--e

No, not injesting them, using them to bond the vinyl together for
pyramid construction. No huge success yet. I've tried pvc cement,
abs cement, and pvc sheet glue--
none seem to be just right. I think I'll have to experiment with some
epoxies. Whatever adhesive it is, I think the key will be to design
the seams so that they're not dependent on the glue as much as the
design (folded several times so nothing can come apart).

I went out to Donna's house, just outside of Ferndale, it shall be
the home of our work parties in the near future. Her family has got
118 acres--plenty of room to build a big ol' pyramid. I'll place the
order monday and have it shipped there.

I found a serious hook-up on generators. We could get two 6,000 watt
gennny's (generic, kind of bottom of the line, but new) for $200
each! That's cheaper than renting half that amount of power for a
single trip to the playa. If I wasn't so broke, I'd snatch them up
right away. The guy has also got a single 15,000 watt generator,
higher quality than the others, for just over $1,000---that's a
screaming good deal. He's also got one other Honda 7,000 watt for
$500. Any/all of these are very tempting.

I expected to pay around $1,000 for generators this year and figured
we'd probably have to throw a fund-raiser to get that money. I'm
wondering a bit about booking a club in Seattle and throwing a party
down there for our fund-raiser. I'm open to any other ideas if
anyone has got anything in mind.

I've uploaded a file to the files section if anyone is curious about
our power needs. If I seem way off here, please let me know. I
think we probably should be pretty good with the two 6,000 watt
generators.

We're getting really close to needing to send in our theme camp
questionaire for placement. Does anyone want to help with this? If
anyone has very basic graphic design skills, we could use a simple
plan of our camp layout. I think if we request less real estate,
we're more likely to get a better spot, (I learned that the hard way
last year).

I've also posted a resource tally sheet. Please post whatever stuff
you've got to share with the camp. Also if you think of things we
need or want to take on a project on the list, please post it.

One last thing and I'll quit rambling on. Most of you that have
camped with big camps are familiar with Camp Fees. This along with
fund-raisers is generally what pays for the infrastructure of a camp
and a rental truck to get it there. This topic is entirely up for
discussion. The camps I've been with have been sliding-scale and
have been effective. I think a likely sum to shoot for will be
between $150 - $200 per person and/or an infrastructure contribution
equivalent (i.e. use of a generator, shade structures, etc.). If
there's someone that is totally broke and just can't come up with
that kind of money (on top of all of the other expenses of going to
BM), but still wants to actively participate and contribute, of
course we'll still welcome them. I'm bringing this up now so that
people on tight budgets can start saving and people overflowing with
abundance can pay theirs now so as to help get things rolling. It
would only take a couple/few people to pay on the high end of the
scale for us to be able to buy those generators now. Then we might
use the them for the fund-raiser.... In camps past, we've had
people pay camp fees that didn't even camp with us. We've had people
pay several times the suggested amount. For this camp, I'm sure we'd
all warmly welcome more of the same. I've just set-up a paypall
account to send money directly to the Boogie Universal bank account.
It's linked to my e-mail address: ***. Yeah, there's a certain amount of trust in sending money to my name, but
hey, if we can't trust each other, why the hell would we be doing
this? I think my five years of volunteering with Boogie Universal
should serve as an adequate reference of trust and dedication to big
fun projects that don't make money.

I think we're around 12 or so pretty solid camp members right now.
The magic number I'm shooting for is around 15-20. I'd say we're in
pretty good shape!

Thanks for reading all this,

E

Here are some photos from E of the DJ Temple his Boogie Universal Collective ("empowering good people to
do Silly Things....") :

Large black plastic and 2x4's for gray water pit. (10X10' should be sufficient for 3ish folks)
Large squeegee for moving graywater around (maximize evaporation) Tie long stick to squeegee.
Crate for standing on in shower.
Solar shower (2 would be nice)
50 gallon drum to hold shower/dish/misc water.
Personal containers for drinking water (around 2 gallons per person per day)
How many cases of Schmidt?
Outfits - look for fauz fir on ebay or craigslist so we can make fuzzy bunny outfits.
Try to find animal ears that are on a headpiece (like the bunny ears in the ski photos) cause if we could give out ears with picture frames.... ooh la la!!
Picture Frames - Think of a easy and cheap way to find materials (driftwood for you coasters and river wood for my inland self) to make our own frames. (they are expensive to buy!)
Stilts - would like to make tree outfits and walk around on stilts (Entish I know)  Maybe I can find some birch bark to make it work.
Generator - I'm on it but look for a Honda 2000i generator. (retail for $1,000 so look for better deals).
Body Lotions - I know vinegar helps to neutralize the playa and fine ladies would give lil' squirtdowns of pure freshness last year.
Material for covering domes. Parachute or something cheaper.
Solar fans?? would help keep domes from stagnating.
Long boards and ski ropes. (so much fun to hook onto an art car and surf the long board!)
I do have some leftover windsurf sails if we wanted to integrate them somehow.
 
Home stereo system for mobile sound system (great finds on craigslist) ie-(http://spokane.craigslist.org/ele/301444322.html cheap good speakers?
http://spokane.craigslist.org/ele/300519521.html
 
Rethinking Milk of Amnesia cause anything dairy or soy based may rot quickly. Another drink we could make?
 
Brewin' ideas ;)
 
Hekter

On May 8, 2007, at 12:01 PM, Scott miller wrote:

I've looked into rv's from the reno area and they are really expensive... seems like the cheapest ones are 2,500 - 3,000 for the week.  Here is a good link.  Sounds too expensive for me ($1,000 each) but I'll look into renting from other areas, although then the gas price is a big factor.
 
http://www.burningman.com/preparation/event_survival/rvs.html
 
The other option is to try and rent my bro's rv from him although I'm not sure how road worthy it is.  Sure would suck to be broken down before even getting to the burn.  Any family members of yours have RV's?  Maybe we need to put a little tidbit on our site asking for rv donations or borrowments?
 
Chris- what is the link so I can upload bm photos?  I would like to put some time into the site this week :)
 
Hekter Updater

Thanks for the update Hekter!  I hear you, bro.  I figured the price for an RV would be pretty steep, but I think we can get it for cheaper.  I'm trying to connect with a private party to see if we can get a better deal.  Check out your brother's rig and find out if its road worthy.  If it is, that's probably the best deal we'll find - no doubt!  I want to put the RV on the wish list on our site.

I think that we can fall back on the dome option it an RV doesn't come through.  We should have the money and the resources to pimp one of those out pretty well.  If we don't have an RV (or if we do) I can get a box trailer from 
Gary that is lockable and sealed so we have some extra hauling capacity.

I haven't sent out a link to the site to my contacts yet.  I feel like we need to give it a little infusion of some fresh musings and give it a "Grand Re-Launching."  If we all send out shout at the same time, we can create bigger cosmic ripples and wash some new people to our cause.  You feel me?

I will try to write a little something on the DJ Fundi / Sunnyland meltdown and send a few pics from the Cottage Groove mix session.  Outside of that, I'll get to work a new podcast for the peeps.  Maybe re-visit one of the mixes from the Cottage Groove session...

Christian, I need to get those dates for Pyramid construction ASAP.  My calendar is filling up waaaaay too fast.  Lemme know so I can show.  Hope you had a soul-filling excursion into the North Cascade wilds.  Pics?

"It's all about the Burn now, from here on out..."
~ Edub 

I could hardly believe the words before my eyes.  Cyberspace provides a limited medium for conveying emotion, but I could feel the angst and frustration flowing through this email.  Sunnyland Soundsystem had experienced a catastrophic meltdown.  A ritual cup of morning coffee – directed by misfortune and gravity, had penetrated the internal circuitry of Sunnyland’s mainframe.  Sunnyland was out of commission and as a result DJ Fundi, the webmaster of DestinationBurningMan was no longer able to post the musings of The Three.  To add insult to injury, this was just the beginning of a long string of misfortunate events that would befall Fundi and bring chaos to Sunnyland.
 
The conversations that followed - once Fundi was able to use his disabled cell phone (yet another misfortunate techno-crisis) were filled with concern and frustration over the podcasts, images and words that were poised to be uploaded to the dBM site.  And, of course, the un-answerable question of whether or not Fundi’s iLife could be resuscitated. 
 
Fortunately, since you are reading this, the crisis in Sunnlyand has been resolved.  At least the mainframe has been re-energized.  The word is still out on the other events that followed….  So, if you haven’t already, head over to the podcast page and download Set 2 of the Burnal Equinox mix.  We are, once again, servin’ it up – live and direct for you!
 
There is much more to come – words, music, images – so stay tuned…..
 
~ Edub