I showed up at the Garage yesterday for pool night, and – surprise! there were a couple dozen of my friends, ready to help celebrate my birthday. Alcohol, hilarity, food, and even a little pool-playing followed. When it got dark, we adjourned to the Rocket Factory and spent a while doing stupid things with dangerous materials. There were no explosions, but we did manage a fair-sized fireball, and learned some useful Lessons for Next Time. After enough of that we rolled back up to Capitol Hill for more drinking, talking, and flirting.

It took me a long time to get started this morning.

Well, I’m definitely going to Burning Man now; it’s just over a month away, and I finally bought a ticket. This is definitely going to be a much lower-key burn than the past few have been for me, but at least I’ll be dressed well.