It's official: Burning Man has a bug problem.
According to a blog posted to the Burning Man website, the rumors that tons of tiny insects have infested Black Rock City -- the site of the Burning Man's desert revelry scheduled to begin on Aug. 30 -- are all true. According to even more Twitter updates, the bugs are biting, crawling and being all-around bummers in Nevada right now. You heard it from blogger John Curley first: "They get up and in you."
Curley, a photographer who's currently in BRC helping to construct the modest infrastructure that greets Burners on the playa, goes on to explain that some of the organizers already on site have encountered a mess of insects that are leaving a trail of red welts in their wake. "What's going on?" you might ask.
"We don’t know," Curley states in his post. "We don’t know how the little critters survive in the heat and the sun. All we know is that if you pick up some wood, you’re likely to uncover hundreds or thousands of the things. They’ve blown up inches deep against the sides of the Commissary tent. They’ve covered the carpets at the Depot. They’re all over the Man Base. So it’s not a localized occurrence, it’s everywhere."
EVERYWHERE.
Curley and his cast of bug-bitten desert people have a couple theories on the insects' origins. Maybe the biters have been laying dormant all spring, and and recent bouts of rain have brought the hell beasts to life earlier than usual. (*Raises fists in the name of climate change.*) Or, maybe the teeny agitators "hitchhiked in on a load of wood from somewhere." Compelling. It's certainly a better guess than the one Shade -- a source we assume is human, and not just a physical manifestation of darkness with communicative abilities -- gave Curley. Johnny Bugseed? Pshaw.
No word on how the Burners plan on decimating the interlopers. There has been talk of nukes. So far, news of the creepy crawlers is only slightly affecting the amount of pre-Burning Man enthusiasm on Twitter.
Wait. Did you hear that? Ah. That was the collective exhale of millions of people who once again said "f**k no" when asked whether they'd enjoy spending days in the desert, bartering for water and food like a couple of Renaissance fair-goers who only wear tutus and glitter speedos.
Note to all those very respectable people still seeking the fiery comfort of an artistic effigy: If you start seeing diseased livestock and thunderstorms of hail and fire, know that the apocalypse is upon us.
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