You should bring everything you will eat, drink and use to Burning Man. Unless you stay at some plug-and-play camp, which even if I was a millionaire I would not do. I want to have the whole Burning Man experience, even the struggles. Here is some of the food that I brought to Burning Man. Not pictured, chips and beverages including water.
And we had this luxurious set up. I did not need to unpack my camp stove or the propane that I brought. Yeay! Our kitchen was underneath a large canpy that provided shade and shelter and we also had a large table. So nice.
Join me on my first couple of days at Black Rock City. The best city on the planet! I drove from Oregon to Nevada in my car by myself. It was the first time traveling to Burning Man by myself. I arrived at the line of cars around 3 15 am and I was thinking ok......maybe three hours or so until I get in. Well, I was wrong. It took about seven hours and it was brutal once the sun came up. Then I was asked to go to the D Lot, which was a first, so somebody could inspect a small piece of carpet that I brought to decide if I could bring it in or not. That took time as well. I was tired and hot, sitting in a car for seven hours inching forward is not fun. It usually does not take this long, it all depends on when you arrive. So I got to the Black Rock desert the night between Sunday and Monday September 5th. And got my ticket about 9 30 am. Brutal.
Holding my ticket, the vehicle pass and the survival guide. Feelings of anticipation and happiness inside my soul.
Then I found my camp, said hello to my campmates, most of them I had not met before. And started to unload my car and putting up my tent. It was sunny and hot and I got tired fast. After I struggled past that and got some food in me I biked out on the playa and looked at the Man. And biked around some more. I can't really describe in words what Burning Man is about. A lot of people come back year after year, I am one of them. This is my home for about a week a year. It truly is a place of a lot of amazing things.
Center Camp under the moon.
Some art inside Center Camp - Objectify Me.
Question. Dear Humanity, What is one thing only a human can become? My answer - Human. I wonder how AI might change Burning Man in the future? I need to go back while things are still "normal".
Tuesday the wind picked up and it stayed windy basically through Thursday late afternoon. Windy means dusty. And it was VERY windy. My tent ripped at some point but not until later in the week. The tent rattled around violently non stop, I am surprised it did not blow away. It was so dusty inside the tent that I woke up on Wednesday morning with completely shut eyes with green eye pus. I spent the next two nights in my campmates RV. Because of the wind it made it difficult do do anything and see anything. I tried but it was hard. One of my campmates and I biked far out on Wednesday afternoon to go look at some art and we ended up in a complete whiteout. It was his first Burn and he had arrived in the US from Saudi Arabia the day before he left for Burning Man. If one can survive Burning Man in a tent for the whole Burn week one can survive a lot, that is all I can say on that. You need long tent poles, here is my collection (not all of them of course, I have like 10 of each or so).
One of my fave art installations this year.
Covering up the face and eyes is a must when it gets dusty. The sand is very fine and soft and blows everywhere. We had strong winds, up to 40 miles/hour. Or more, I am not sure. The wind was so strong that I did not have to pedal my bike at times, I just sat in the saddle and sailed around with the wind. Crazy.
Some random pictures that spoke to me.
And some cute couple bikes. It is so cute when people make their bikes look fun and cute. I am too lazy, I have lights on my bike and that's it. No E bike for me, I pedal around. Great excercise.
By Tuesday evening I looked like this. A complete mess. My visions of looking cute and beautiful and taking some pretty pictures of myself flew out the window. My hair, coated in a layer of dust here, basically stayed in a braid to the side the whole Burn except when I went foaming. White eyebrows, yikes. Make up? Forget it. I brough my make up bag but only used lip balm and a tweezer. I had dust and crust all over. You pull slugs out of your nose. I do not know how people manage to look flawless at Burning Man. They probably stay in RVs or camper trailers, which is much easier than a tent. I told my campmate that my fingers were brown because I fell into a porta-potty. She believed me at first. LOL. I was eating trail mix with chocolate that had melted, hence the brown fingers.
This year's Burning Man art theme was Axis Mundi. Next year it is Spellbound. I hope that they (the BORG) make the art theme more obvious next year. When you first get into Black Rock City, which is a city built from nothing and becomes an amazing magical place, you get handed the What? Where? When? book and a map of all the camps and other important information. The 10 Principles of Burning Man are explained. Although there are Burning Man phone apps now (like iBurn), which are easy to navigate and tell you everything. I have all my books saved. All my stickers saved. I cleaned, organized and put away my Burning Man bins the other day. Took inventory of what I need to stock up on for next year, if anything. I think I will get a new pair of boots for next year, a robe to schlep around in when I first get up in the mornings, some soft slippers (I had a pair in 2023), a warm fake fur hat for the chilly nights and a longer coat. Yes, I definitely want to experience Burning Man (again) next year. I LOVE Black Rock City! I made new friends this year and we are planning on going back, most of us. A lot can happen in a year......so I am hoping that Burning Man 2027 Spellbound is in the cards for me.
Well reality arrived.....I reluctantly made it back from Burning Man last night. Not at all thrilled to be back. I have showered, washed my hair and put on lotion. And sat down on a real toilet seat. This was probably the dirtiest and crustiest I have ever been. Before I go to bed I will drink more water, layer on more lotion and brush my teeth. This is a picture of my Playa hair, which felt like a heavy cake resting on my head. It was in one braid off to one side for most of the time on the Playa. Hopefully I won't lose too much hair when combing it out.
I have cried leaving Burning Man before. Reality is different than Black Rock City. And yes I know that if I lived at Black Rock City year round it would become reality as well, a rather harsh reality because Burning Man is NOT easy. So yea....reality again, or the Default World (everything that is not Black Rock City) with everything that comes with that. I do not want to check my emails, go to the grocery store, sit in traffic, pay bills and go through the endless tasks on my to do list.
The art theme of last year's Burning Man was called Tomorrow Today. I had a ticket but decided against going. All my Burning Man gear was stored in the very back of a storage unit, I did not want to move stuff out in order to get to the Burning Man gear. It felt overwhelming. I also did not want to go by myself but finding somebody to experience Burning Man with is not that easy. I am not looking for somebody to latch onto at Burning Man but going with a friend is nice. I was also very sad almost all of last year and I did not want to feel like that at Burning Man. I ended up watching Burning Man online, there was a 24/7 camera at Black Rock City. I was a bit sad that I did not go but I survived. Here are some pictures that I took of last year's Burn while watching it on my iPad.
Wellllll.....there are people at Black Rock City right now, most of them have Early Arrival passes and are working hard setting up for the coming week. The 2026 Burning Man art theme is Axis Mundi. "Latin for axis of the world describing a symbolic or physical center point that connects the heavens, the earth, and the underworld." I love the theme and I am heading towards Black Rock City in a couple of days.
Week 19, it has been several months since I posted the weekly work at the club updates. Not sure why the pictures are showing up this blurry, they look better on my phone.
This is what one does when the club is empty, or if nobody is sitting around the stage and paying attention to you. There are many people that go to strip clubs and do things like read a book.....yes we had a guy that would sit at the bar and read a book the whole time he was in and he would usually stay for a couple of hours. The club was his library. He was telling us by his actions that the book was so much more interesting than everything else and that he was too intellectual for us. I feel that there is a time and place for everything. Just like I would not wear only fishnet stockings and a bra while shopping for groceries, although I would fit right in at certain Walmarts wearing just that, or sit and read a book during a concert. Anyhow, I of course did not engage with him. Sit there with your book. Some come in just to play pool and stare at us. And some come in to drink only and stare at us. You know.....because there are no regular bars to go to, if you go to a strip club to drink you can sit there with a beer for a few hours and stare at girls for free. In some clubs they tell the people that come in and do this to leave. Good! But since our club is a bar and not a strip club (according to the owner of the establishment) it is more than ok that people sit and stare at us for free while drinking beer. Whatever. I do know this, if the dancers would stop showing up the bar would last maybe a month. In Oregon we also have something called video lottery. Some sort of a gambling machine that people will sit in front of and stare at for hours. The video lottery machines are often more interesting than the dancers. But a lot of times the people playing the machines will engage with the dancers. They do get up and away from the video lottery trance and tip us. Week 19. At the beginning of the night on Friday an older man that has no money came in. I know that he comes in just to talk, because he is lonely but he is nice and actually has something to say, I do enjoy bantering with him. So I sat in my street clothes and talked to him for like 1 1 /2 hour. He says that he comes in to talk to me, I don't mind. I am a therapist as well. Some people just want somebody to talk to. Nobody was dancing on stage. One girl was on stage taking pictures of herself. The older man left and after a while some people came in. It was a slow night but I entertained myself by playing fun songs to dance to. Then another person came in just for me. Turns out that I have a whole crew of people that come in just for me. That is so nice!
Siren wrote that one the board. I thought that was cute. And that my friends were the last pictures that I took at that club. That was my last week there. Since those were the last pictures, I am including this one too that I took a while back but forgot to insert in the weekly recap. When people leave you change as tip. I guess in Canada leaving coins as tip is normal. Some of their coins have more value than the coins here in the US. If somebody would come in with a suitcase full of coins for me I would take it. Bring in the bags and suitcases full of coins that you have collected over the years! Anyhow.....I saw the coins and picked them up. And said yes......laundry money thank you! But in general it is seen as rude (at least in the US) to leave coins as tip. Perhaps the person that left me the two quarters was poor and that is all they had? I've been tipped a deck of cards and a can of sardines before. So.....
