Thursday, 08.26.04 Amazingly enough, everything we brought with us from Oakland was still there the next morning! Only the pink suitcases had attempted an escape. If you look carefully, you can see how the overnight and early morning rains left the playa moist, but were mild enough that the ground under the Jeep and trailer were still dry. *

Everything seemed right with the world when I first espied Bruce sporting his trusty sombrero that morning. I had waited all year to see that magnificent sight, and as such experienced an immediate feeling of relief when I finally witnessed it, sensing that now everything was as it should be.

It wasn't too much later that morning while setting up my tent that I discovered that my air mattress had developed a fatal wound. Nate struggled valiantly to pull the patient through, even resorting to plying a tiny butane powered soldering iron to seal the edges of the gaping wound, but alas it was simply this mattress's day to die. A May Day call to Mark several days later resulted in the fortunate arrival of a new mattress, even though I had managed to slumber peacefully in the meantime in a makeshift bower of memory foam, blankets and a leopard patterned rug.

Later that day we made our first visit out to the site on the open playa designated for our project, the Singularity Machine. Markers are left by the Burning Man DPW team to give guidance on the vicinity in which the piece should be placed.

So much blank dirt. Where to put the heart of the machine? An important decision that must be weighed carefully.

And while it certainly gets the creative juices flowing, simple neocromancing isn't nearly powerful enough to yield a sign of this import.

Thankfully Bruce appeared at just that moment to add his considerable brain power to the problem.

Mysteriously, shortly after arriving, Bruce fell to the ground and plunged into a deep trance. Or maybe he was just tired and hot from his bike ride across the playa. I can't remember.

Don't you get the sense that I'm ripe for a highly successful career in rock album photography?