Burning Venus?

Another thing Kevin Alexander Scott,  my departed-all-too-goddamn-early-first-bestest-friend, would’ve/could’ve done—Burning Man. Ah who am I kidding. I wouldn’t be able to tolerate the desert heat or the lack of indoor plumbing and Kevin…well, I suspect he’d get tired of all the hippy-ed out, freaky people after a couple days. I could be wrong.

Why's this come up? Jenny just sent me a vid from this years extravaganza. Oh man, I SO want to do this!

Here’s what I’d do if I could stand it (and that if is 12 feet tall). I’d transform Bix into a giant, moving sculpture—Birth of Venus maybe? Bix’s body would be the half shell with Venus rising above. They call them Mutant Vehicles.

Or, possibly, with the just completed fish mural in mind, there’d be a six foot salmon, leaping out of glittering blue water. OR I could bring my trike and fashion a long, iridescent, articulated eel.

Hmmmm, now that I'm thinking on it, I could do this for the Cambridge Sculpture Race next year. Honestly, the biggest prob with Burning Man, for me, is that it’s in Nevada which is, oh, about 3,000 miles away. Considering the event's a week long deal and participants need to pack in all their own food, water and shelter on top of the supplies for creating giant moving sculptures, driving out there would be necessary. I’m NOT driving 3,000 miles.

Of course, I could mebbe talk some of my pals who live out west *cough* Julie, Jenny *cough* into this. I could fly out to Phoenix. We’ll load up one of their cars with supplies and go. Better yet, we could rent an RV. No, there’s no electric or sewer hook ups BUT at least we could sleep on beds and have room for the 500 bazillion gallons of water we’d need to bring.

Another hurdle—the ticket price. A quick perusal shows 4,000 tickets available “pre-sale” at $800. “Direct Group,” “Individual” and “OMG” tickets are $390. I don’t know what any of this means. Add to this the $50 vehicle pass, “applicable fees” (what are these?!) cost for food and bev for the week and all the supplies for building my giant super-eel or Venus on the smartcar shell.

This is getting pretty damn pricey. Still, it seems like it’d be so much damn fun! Maybe I’ll just start with the Cambridge Sculpture Race. I could try to find some folks who’ve done Burning Man and ask them all about their experiences. Also too, will there be other 50 somethings there or would I be the lone grandma in a sea of 20 year olds?

More research is needed!