It's that time of year when many of your friends are making daily runs to hardware stores and ill-advised clothing stores and REI in preparation for their annual pilgrimage to the playa. Whether you've joined them in the past and just can't hack it this year, or whether you've really, constitutionally, never been able to fathom the whole thing, we stand with you in solidarity this year as non-Burners. We know, it's a terrific, mind-altering party that requires many months of decompression and therapy afterward, and anyone who isn't going is so missing out. Well, whatever. To paraphrase the great Peggy Lee, the reaction of the harder-to-please and more frat-party-averse among us is more likely to be "Is that all there is to Burning Man?"
Below, some thoughts to comfort yourself with if you think you're missing out, or to validate your choice of never going.
1. When seen from the air, it just looks like a giant desert trailer park.
2. You actually have time to do stuff this month, like go to the beach/park/wine country, instead of sitting in your garage with your campmates constructing pieces of your elaborate theme camp.
3. Or organizing a last-minute fundraiser for your theme camp.
4. Or sitting at home sewing your outfit.
5. Or washing last year's playa dust out of your Muppet-fur boots.
6. You've felt a little sad all year for that graphic designer in your office who never talks about anything but Burning Man, and this year's camp theme, and his life seems kinda, well, empty without it.
7. You know that the best weeks to be in the city are the week before Labor Day, and Christmas, because you practically have it to yourself.
8. There are better things to spend your money on (food, rent, trip to Europe) than the grand or so that this adventure will end up costing. (Or more if you're these people.)
9. Plus the $55+ to get your car or RV hosed off when you get back.
We bet the price will even go up this year. Photo: Andrew Dalton/SFist
10. There are also better things to spend your precious vacation days on (trip to Europe).
11. More people are dragging their kids along to the playa, so you know it's jumped the shark.
12. Then there's the dust.
13. So much dust.
14. And the lack of running water/nearby medical facilities/decent cocktails...
15. You enjoy spending actual money on things you need and desire.
16. And you're really, really tired of hearing twentysomethings talk about how awesome and utopian the barter/gift economy is. You get it.
17. Because if you wanted to live in a shack like this with a couple dusty couches and a generator you would move to rural Mexico.
19. And though sometimes you wish you were, you're just not that much of a naked person.
20. We could go on.
21. And then there's this guy.
22. You've been once or twice, and it was a swell party with some awesome art, but you really don't have the time or energy for that schlep anymore!
23. Or the serotonin to spare. *wink*
24. It really is a long-ass drive.
25. And good luck getting back in to the city on Labor Day if the Bay Bridge is closed!
(Photo: Getty Images)
And if all this just makes you sad and nostalgic (instead of relieved and self-satisfied), there's always next year!
Previously: 17 Signs You're Too Old For Music Festivals
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