BloodyMaryLand

Apparently from ‘07. See the whole Burning Man Skills 2007 instructable.

This instructable also made me wonder how to build a yurt.  Here’s a site that tells you how, and includes instructions for several other structures, such as wigwams and domes: http://housing.byrene.com

Mindy and Eric will be pleased to learn that I have acquired the 2007 Halloween Special Edition of Make Magazine. Now, the magazine has fewer glow-in-the dark ideas than we were hoping for, but it did have some interesting articles that with a bit of creativity could be reused on the playa. (If recreating a haunted house on the playa was our thing, we could use the whole issue, but that’s neither here nor there).

The “Headless Marie Antoinette Costume” article has instructions on how to create lightweight foam shapes from plaster molds for use in costumes. Key ingredient I didn’t know about previously: FlexFoam-iT X liquid foam, which apparently dries into a nerf-like substance after it has been poured into a mold. Sounds not too different from the minimally-expanding foam you get at home-improvement stores, but probably easier to work with.

There is also a super-easy craft “Diabolical Horns.” Basically, you use air-dry craft clay, shape the horns, put toothpicks in them to make holes for an elastic string that will hold them onto your head, let them dry, then decorate. The article calls for glue and red glitter, but paint should work too. Mold the clay a different way, and you’ll get a different headpiece. I’m sure there are all kinds of air-dry clays, but here are two I came up with quickly with a search at Michael’s craft store website: Crayola Model Magic Fusion and Paperclay.

For light-up magic, there is a Cylon jack-o’-lantern project that incorporates LEDs into the eyepiece of the (old-school) cylon. The people that made this pumpkin have a fairly cool website of their own: http://www.evilmadscientist.com/
(pause while Alison gets distracted by looking at multiple LED projects)

There was one final project in the issue that caught my eye, though it will be too bulky for us to bring. The “Ultimate Fog Chiller” creates cool fog by taking a fog machine and passing the output through a trashcan filled with ice via an aluminum dryer hose. DIY air-conditioning! How cool would it be to get a blast of cool air on a hot desert day? Anyhow…

In the spirit of the 2007 Green Man, I was compelled to purchase this book, “Generation T: 108 Ways to Transform a T-Shirt,” which outlines how to deconstruct an old T-shirt and modify it into something new. If you’re like me, you have a collection of old, too-big, too small, or dorky corporate t-shirts that are just sitting around and taking up space in your wardrobe. Why not recycle them into a playa-fabulous outfit? It’s cheap, and some of these costume ideas do not even require sewing. Sweet.

My guitarist’s dog was sporting a new Nite Ize collar last night and it looked like a great piece of playa gear. Very tough, easy to attach, and with a purported 250 hour battery life (large hearing-aid style) — I was impressed. Turns out the company makes all kinds of glow gear:

http://www.niteize.com/category.php?category_id=26

They don’t seem to have a wide range of colors but the prices look good.

Hooray! We successfully gathered the following people at Ryan Wilkinson’s house this past Sunday:

Herb, Alison, Mindy, Eric, Ryan W., Will, Fitz, Meredith, Sean

In case you don’t believe we managed to get that many people together at the same place at the same time, I have photo proof. Click any image to view the larger version.

Meeting Notes:
At this first meeting we dusted off our notes from 2006 and reviewed what needs improvement in 2008. We worked off a list of handwritten notes that came from the return RV trip to the east coast. We also have a fantastic starting point in this list for improving the bloody mary bar, provided by Dave just after the ‘06 burn.

We talked about who would be driving and who would be flying, and how many people we should bank on making it to ‘08. For planning purposes only, we estimate that we will have 15 campers. We’ll have more of a definite idea when people start buying their tickets.

Definitely driving from the east are:
Will, Fitz, Mindy, Ryan W., Sean
This is important, because if there are too few drivers, we don’t have an RV coming from the east coast. Ryan S. and Meredith may also join the drivers in one direction.

We will also have an RV from the west, captained by Weaver. The remainder will be flying into Reno. Logistics of getting the flyers to the playa are yet to be determined, but should there be too many to squeeze into the west coast RV, there is always the rideshare option.

We started in on the handwritten notes and made these additional comments:

• we need more chile for the cowboy sunset
• we ran out of drinking water last time. more needed.
• gallon jugs of water should be labeled on Monday, first thing, to be sure everyone has and is drinking their alotted amount. no more labeling as you go.
• presume you will be responsible for your own breakfast. bring breakfast bars or whatever it is you like to eat that requires little preparation
• more premade food, like the frozen chile, or boil in a bag meals, would make our lives easier, and create less mess.
• we need to be better about reducing the amount of trash we produce. it is hard to haul out all those bags. bring CANS of tomato juice instead of plastic, because we can flatten them more easily
• bring a can crusher
• we need trash and recycling bins, with large openings and easy to identify
• the bloody mary bar needs shutters or something to indicate it is closed
• the bar needs to be longer, to fit 3 people behind it and in front of it
• let’s try to keep the ice we put in drinks dust-free (TRY, at least)
• make it easier to identify our group’s bikes at night

HOMEWORK:
Herb – windmill power research. get the specs and supply list. start figuring out where to get parts.
Sean - shade structure research. tell us how to build the tension structure you were talking about
Eric – grey water evaporation research. can we make this work better than the pond we built previously?

Behold it’s Ferro-Magnificent Splendor!

For those who weren’t at today’s meeting. I’m still pining for this giant 550lb monster lodestone to set up as a “Temple of Magnetism” at burning man. Probably will never happen because of the cost, but still, wouldn’t it be cool???

For sale here: http://www.buylodestones.com/biglodestone.htm for a mere $1500 and I don’t even want to think about the shipping costs!