EP 10 "Playa" Pete

This episode of The Shadow of the Man podcast features an interview with Playa Pete, a veteran burner preparing for his thirtieth consecutive year at the Burning Man event. Pete shares his origin story from 1995, recounting how a chance meeting with founder Michael Mikel (Danger Ranger) led to his long-standing role printing official apparel for the organization and the DPW (Department of Public Works). The conversation explores the culture of the desert city, detailing the construction of the Monaco art car and the shift from the event's early, anarchic days to its current, more bureaucratic reality. Ultimately, Pete reflects on the transformative impact the festival had on his personal confidence and family life, while announcing his plan to return to his roots by camping solo as a "first-time burner" to rediscover the event's original spirit.

Transcript

They make the trek out to Burning Man for a week and a day. After a lot of work, oh, there's a lot of play. Party party drama drama drama. b****, b****, b****. Year after year, they come back to scratch that itch. They all say their lives have been changed. After many years, lives have have been rearranged. That changes what this show is all about. You'll see the impact of Burning Man up and out. So sit back, relax, and cancel all your plans. These are the stories about the shadow of the man. 

Hello and welcome to The Shadow of the Man. I am your host Andy. Oh ho ho. Bad Andy. Today our guest is Playa Pete. Hey there Pete. How you doing?

Well, hey That Andy. How are you? Good to you.

So I definitely have some listeners who've like never been to Burning Man or some like new burners. So uh what would you say like in a 20 30 second description of like who Ply Pete is? Like what your Burning Man experience is?

Uh Uh well this will be my 30th year in a row and

in a row.

In a row. Yeah.

Wow.

And uh long time ago I came up with uh my moniker that is Pia Pete. I am the baddest man in Black Rockck. So bad I got to kick my own ass twice daily. And that's just to stay in shape. That as in beach and Pete as moss because I kind of grow on you after a while. Yeah. So that's what I usually say to the new people. Unfortunately, the old people, OG's like my friends go, "If I f****** hear that one more time.

Oh, yeah. So, your first year is what was it? 95?"

Yep. Yeah.

Wow.

I uh was uh I uh had a t-shirt company called uh friends of mine, uh, five of us, called Stinkfish Action Wear. And we were way ahead of our time. And, um, I'll never forget the day this gentleman walks into my office and I swear it was the man with the yellow hat from Curious George, minus the monkey. It just just stood out aura around him. Anyways, he said, uh got uh some friends of his are doing the beta breakers popular running event here in San Francisco and I been used to making the shirts all for years and he says oh no we're not like that we uh we dress as giant salmon and then we pop out from the alley in the middle of the street when that 50,000 group of runners come down and then we just bob up and down like we're spawning salmon and I go, "f***, that's the best one yet." Anyways, I back later and he uh orders a dozen shirts for his uh wacky little event in the desert and he leaves me a VHS tape, says, "Uh, you seem like you have an open mind." And I didn't even own a VHS player yet. So, it sat on my desk for a couple of weeks and then finally I got one. brought it home and I watched it and the editing was as if it was done now. I mean, it was just bing bing bing, just shots of Bernie, man. But I had never seen anything like that. And so I talked to my uh wife who I'd been married to at 15 years at that time and I go, "Hey, what do you think? We should go." I called him up and said, "Yeah, I'd like to go." And he goes, "All right, I'm gonna leave you your tickets behind Bruno's Bar next to the radio town. hour under a rock and that's where he left those tickets for 10 years. So anyway, we go and uh I drive the seven eight hours. I read the survival guide to the tea. I probably overdid it, you know, too much rebar, too much. And uh and then um I took a bunch of uh blinky lights, highway lights from the city of Fairfax yard and uh they they didn't have LED lights, flashlights were, you know, luxury items. So anyway, I go and I arrive out in the desert and a guy in a silver trailer half naked gives me I believe it's naked Bob gives me the uh directions. I need you to go about five miles this way heading out north and then you got to veer left a little bit. If you go straight, you're going to get bogged down and you're not getting taken out for another week. So pay attention. So, as you go uh to the left, and I want you to go about 10 miles that way. And so, I'm doing 90 miles an hour, cruising along, and I finally see the blue light in the background. I'm like, "Oh my gosh, what is that?" And as I get closer, I, you know, I'm doing 90 miles an hour and all a sudden this tent goes by and then vehicles and I'm like, "Whoa, it's got to slow down a tad." And as we get closer, center camp was, you know, was 50 feet or something was kind tiny and there was a big fire basically center camp and few people around it and I'll never forget it Andy I'd been driving 10 hours my uh hands are wet on the wheel you know I'm just tired and I look out and I see this half man half horse uh centaur you know what centaur is

yeah

it's f****** a centaur dude in the middle of nowhere and it's looking right at me with this blazing fire in the background and it's just piercing eyes and this big tall finger and it's just going come to me and I look at what the f*** I go I'm sorry honey we I made a major error some sort of pagan ritual we're out of here just head out into the desert camp overnight and then we're going to Yuseite in the morning then f*** this so we blaze out and uh camp about a mile away and and then uh and then like all all nightmares that you have, you wake up in the morning, you go, "That wasn't a nightmare." s***. So, I got on my bike, I rode into town. Within 10 minutes, I got a Bloody Mary. I got pacing and egg breakfast. I come back, I tell my wife, I go, "I don't know. I think it's just this fun Halloween party." And uh and then and then here's the ending of the story. All of a sudden, this plane is driving, flying around, was little Piper 150, and it lands and it comes right up to my truck, my tent, and this girl, maybe 5'2, jumps out, folded bike, unfolds it, asks me to help her cover her plane, ties it down, and rides off with her backpack, says, "Can you keep an eye on my plane for the next five days?" So, I'm sitting there looking at the plane going, "Uh, what do you think, honey?" And within three hours, two more show up and ever since then I think fly Pete invented airport.

Wow.

One of these days I'm going to airport and actually gonna tell that f****** story at the

Oh yeah, maybe I'll get a drink.

Yeah, don't even get me started on all the stupid stories that I have.

Well, we'll get there. We'll get there. So, anyway, so let's let's start start in the beginning. Uh like who who is Ply? Where where did you grow up? Like where where does the story begin?

Uh I uh was born in Vancouver, British Columbia. My parents are from Berlin, Germany. They immigrated in 1958. Uh they didn't speak any English. They had $5 in their pocket. And uh I was born, like I said, in Vancouver. And um stayed there for a couple of years. Uh my dad was uh working for the railroad building tunnels. They used the uh German immigrants for that strong work. And then Um, and then he had a friend that was a Volkswagen mechanic. First time Volkswagens ever came into America and was in Marin County. And so they moved us down to Marin County. And that's when Marin was just magical, magical back then. In 1962, and I stayed there till probably I was about 10. Parents got divorced. I moved to Reno and uh lived there for about five years introduced to uh the Black Rock Desert because we hunted there and Gerlac and Bruno's and you know

Oh, so you knew the whole area way before that? I

I don't want to say I knew the whole area. It was verbolton, man. That was insane. Everybody that I know would go, "Are you Why would you? That's death. Why would you go out there and throw a party?" They still haven't gotten gotten that. But u No. At some point you'll have to uh At some point you'll have to uh remind me of the story of the snipers that were up in the mountains that were going to shoot the Burning Man participants.

Yeah.

All right. We'll get back to that. Yeah.

Yeah. My brother called me up and said, "You can't go this year. You can't go."

I don't know. I remember there was one year there was some like weird dude. He was like all it was almost like a ghillie suit or whatever and I He was like kind of just crawling around. He had I don't know if it was an actual gun or something, but had like a laser and he kind of crawl underneath cars and on top of things and and I remember just kind of seeing him there like we walked past and I just kind of like looked down. I was like, "Hey, dude. I I could totally see you, you know, and it's just like move along, move along."

Yeah.

Yeah. We got some weird ones up there. I've always said it's the misfit toys. That's why I've been so

Yeah. Yeah. So, kind of Olympics to some people too, you know. But uh yeah, so you grew up like so Vancouver, Marin, Reno, and that's what like 60s7s and then uh so then I actually uh moved up to Seattle uh for my last few years. Graduated from Isukqua uh and uh messed around a little bit and then uh decided to go in the Air Force and I was a fireman in the Air Force. Uh

ah

yeah,

I don't know why you were in the Air Force, huh?

That's a whole another story. Let's just say they kindly asked me to leave after three years, two months. And uh yeah, that's a whole another story. That should be a movie. Anyway,

and what years was that when we were in the Air Force?

That was 1980 to 83.

Yeah.

And so then I moved uh I moved back down to Marin. I'd uh spent some time uh traveling and I just found uh that that was the always my fondest memories and I had you know fair amount of friends here. I'd come every year for the summer and so I moved back down and uh started working the uh the trades doing carpentry and and then one time then one day uh I uh somebody asked me to do some uh photooots and next thing you know I'm want to be a want be a wannabe model. Uh did that for about five years San Francisco.

Really?

Yeah. Did uh Europe

didn't know that.

Spent about three months living in Europe and s***. I just I just saw this the other day.

Wow. You're like a Zoolander.

Yeah. My Exactly. My agent uh owned this comp uh agency called Next and I believe his name was Juan Carlo. His name is TW brother owned it and trippy fellas. But all of a sudden, I'm sitting there watching I don't know TV the other day and I see him in Epstein f****** plane being massaged by Gain Maxwell and I'm like, "Oh my gosh, that's what explains these jaunts these guys were taking early.

I never got to go." Yeah.

You see, if you had played Drake Harts, right, you could have been on that same jet there.

Yeah. The the some of the boys didn't ended up going to the Elton John concerts over in London, but I never I actually went to be Ritz and surf for the weekend. But yeah, then I got out of the uh uh the military, moved to San Francisco again and uh started that up and uh through the process of um working there in the uh and I met a group of guys and they had started that t-shirt company and once that t-shirt company got going along pretty good. We were we were busting it. And uh and that's when uh Michael Michael came into my office dressed uh like the uh man with the yellow hat and he honestly to this day he changed my life that day.

Oh yeah. Oh yeah.

Absolutely. I I with through that now that I've you know come past all this time and all these things that

Well, that's essentially what this show is all about you know. It's like yeah the change that Bernie made like what happened you know. So yeah. So it's For the viewers or listeners at home, Michael Michael is also known aka Danger Ranger, one of the original, I guess you'd say, one of the founders of Burning Man.

Yep. Society, Mary prankster from the beginning. Ah, the stories.

Did you ever like do any of the cacophony of stuff like in San Francisco? Like any like the

No, I should have though. That's right up my alley.

Yeah, there there's some stuff like before I moved there that fun. Like they would have these parties and like those old like bunkers and you know and places like that. And

I remember like doing some like these like weird scavenger hunts and stuff like all over the city and these crazy parties like in like China Basin or like in Oakland

Santa Con.

I never actually did the Santa Con, but uh Okay. So this is this episode is going to be coming out later in the year. I mean it's not exactly my official holiday episode, but I mean I mean do you have any Uh it you you did some Sicon stuff, right?

Yeah, I I have. But uh it they were the ones that started and it was it was a lot funner then. Now if s***, I think every city in the dang country does a Santa Con.

Well, why don't you explain for our listeners what Santa Con is? Say

uh Well, a bunch of people would dress up as Santa Claus and then just get together and go bar hopping. And then it got to be a lot more and more and pretty soon they were taking over buses and going into Macy's and yeah they were you know fairly uh

barrel

uh cheery let's say and uh a lot of skin was being shown and it it was it was a fun time but uh you can see how easily that would catch on and then before you know it every pub crawl is this anacon during the holidays

and this is just during the holidays right?

Yeah it was just for uh Christmas. It was just Christmas Santa Con.

So, yeah. So, you first went in 95. Uh, and then I guess the bug bit you and you came back. I mean, do you did you have the the same thing everyone gets? You come back and you're just kind of like, you know, evangelizing around like, "Oh my god, Bernie man, you got to come with me."

Uh, yeah, that's a good way of putting it because within two weeks of getting back and settled in and somewhat decompressed, I I to this day When somebody comes with me and goes back and says, "Ah gosh, that was great. Thanks." I go, "Yeah, just wait till the dreams start." And they're like, "Dreams?" And I go, "Yeah, give it about two weeks, a month." All of a sudden, you start going to bed at night and you think about going back and how can I make camp better for everybody? And it just goes and to this day, that's pretty much how I f****** go to bed at night. I dream about Burning Man. And gosh, what will I look to do better this year? Or do you ever have like the not quite the dream, but more the nightmare? It's like you wake up and all a sudden it's like you're at Burning Man. You're like, "Oh, wait, what? I'm here like I I didn't pack anything."

Yeah. Actually, the my uh uh story for that is I the way that I've gotten involved with Burning Man is I printed all the garments for the org for years, DPW, J Rangers, and a lot of that was had to be done within like weeks pre-event. So, I would work 24/7 for six weeks before that event. And it'd be 2 3 in the morning. Sweat is rolling down my forehead into my eyes. It's stinging and I'm listening to my favorite band, which is the Merman Surf Band, local San Francisco band. Also happened to be what I'll call the house band for Burning Man. Early on,

they actually stayed at my house a number of years ago. They came out here. Yeah. Yeah. They came out here to Hawaii. I haven't talked to those guys in a long time. But anyway,

rocketed, dude. They're f****** killing.

Really? Wow.

So, uh, what my I lost my train of thought.

No, you were working late, sweating, listening to the merman.

Listen to the merman. And I would close my eyes, Andy, and I would imagine myself up at the play at Kazvert radio on Esenade watching the mermaid. And then I go, "All right, I'm watching them." And now I'm going to close my eyes because I want to picture myself back at the printing press so that when you do that and I'm actually at Burning Man, it'll be 10 times better. So

yeah. So how many years did you do that? Make all You did what? Like t-shirts, hats, like all sorts of uh

I did all their stuff for a better part of 20 years. Uh I still do. a lot of this stuff. But as the uh event got bigger and there more people um it became it'd be like since I know you you go hey uh I I want you to do all the shirts for our camp and next thing you know you got regionals you got uh Maui and uh and all the other islands and they have all their own people and before you know it it's just this giant family but

uh I don't get to do all of them anymore. I don't think I could because it's so much work. Um especially right at the last minute. How do you know what the size of your volunteer is two months ahead of time? You don't. So, you have to, you know, get your information at the LA and I'm literally driving. Sometimes I'm driving to the vent two, three times pre just to make sure the stuff gets there in time

and saving UPS because that's a fortune. And uh I don't mind visiting the the desert. a few times.

Yeah. Yeah. I imagine that over the years the uh the sizes probably have increased.

Yeah. Yeah. Every year it was a lot less. I kind of liked it.

No, I bet like the sizes as in like, you know, instead of like small, medium, large, it's more like medium, large, extra large, and then like large, extra large, double XL.

You're referring to t-shirt sizes.

Yeah.

All the way up to XL. No, you try to a long sleeve 100% cotton dress shirt for a Ranger that's 6XL and it sure the f*** better not be polyester because those will self emoliate out in the f****** ply. Trust me, I know. I had to take 10 grand of them back because they were polyester.

Really?

Yeah.

Yeah, that was not a good one. I had a huge giant falling out.

Oh no.

Yeah. One spark lands on Ranger on burn night. They can't pat it out. They uh will actually catch fire. I'm like, you got to be kidding me.

Wow.

Well, no. A lot a lot of rules these days, you know. They didn't used to be way back then, you know.

Yeah.

I remember actually like last episode had uh Coyote on and I remember I probably told you this story, but like uh it was like it was always just a joke. It would never actually do. Made sure people knew it was a joke, you know, like coming doing like a ply ocean. and then going around putting like a large like like violation sticker on like DPW like windshields like you know and like running away. But then it's funny cuz Coyote's like no that's actually kind I mean without the putting the sticker on the windshield you know he's just like no I am like the OSHA like supervisor for printing man. I was like oh wow I guess that's what we're doing nowadays.

I've I've had a a a lovehate relationship with DPW since day one. the uh there's always pranks played back and forth and they won

less love and more love. Yeah.

Yeah. They won the last one. Uh and then the one that I wanted to do was completely shut down by captain of the ship, the Monaco as well as uh Cobra Commander Logan. He said, "You're f****** insane. They'll kill you for that one. Want to hear?"

Sure.

So, I was always invited to go on to the Thursday parade, DPW parade, when they gi when they get all the trucks and all DPW gets to close the town down and this giant python of trucks and DPW slowly meanders through and everybody's going, "Hey, how thank you. Thank you." And they're all going, "f*** you." No. Anyways, so I go to the

That's pretty, man.

I go to the uh the the uh parade and I show up in all my pink fur outfit and that's not what they're into. and they just f****** hated me. So I got on the back of the truck to get on the parade and everybody got off. So it was funny to go to this because you Coyote and Logan and I know some Will and the other people. So I'm talking to them, but the minute they turn their back, I'm like at the King's Castle and the Dobermans are like So anyway, it's been this lovehate relationship. Uh they uh we drive the ship by their trade sometimes and then we'll shoot them with water and and with from the cannon that we have. And then one year they f****** came into the quiet plaza and they dropped off one of their s***** ass vehicles and played nothing but classical music for three days. It drove the camp crazy. People were going to smash the windows and I go, "You f****** touch that car, you're dead. Don't even mess with it. They'll come and get it when they're good and ready."

Wow.

I decided to come up with a king of all pranks. I since I make all their shirts um for the parade, they have uh about 50 red shirts that they give the the key people. These are earned positions. These are trusted DPW people. They're going to close the roads while the parade is going on. It's an honor position. You get a red shirt, you're somebody. So, I made an extra one. I was going to put one of my guys in it. We were going to put them up on the rigging of the ship about 20 feet hanging from there and then I was going to pull a big bull whip out and pretend I'm beating him as we're driving by.

Yeah, that that would have not gone over too well. So, yeah, they won with the car. Oh, and then I I'll end it with this. So, my my hat and my shirts. I always wear DPW stuff. And whenever they catch me, if there's a DPW guy that catches me walking around and hey, I don't quite recognize you, they get the shirt off my back or the hat.

Wow. Really?

I've done it a bunch of times. I'm like, ah, I'm just a I'm a poser.

You have every right to take the shirt off my back.

So, yeah. So, for the listeners who don't know, Uh explain what the Monaco is.

Uh the Monaco is a uh 18th century naval frigot uh Captain Ray Baron uh came up with after we had been cruising around and we saw the Lock and Tessa where the Lock and Tessa one of the most beautiful ships ever. It was pirate ship and it literally had the cannons had gone through the sails and it just looked beautiful but it only ran for a day and I think uh maybe one of the reasons was it had uh not uh too many chiefs and not enough Indians and uh you can't have that. The Monaco it has one chief, one captain that's captain Greg Baron and uh I made a rule long time ago at Ply Pete's Plaza. I have three rules. No meth, no drama. The captain's always right. That's pretty simple. Did I have murder in there? anywhere. No.

Well, I'm pretty sure you can do at least two of those. The middle one, the drama. I'm like, ho, the Monaco was uh designed off a 19 I believe 1983 Monaco chassis. Greg picked it out on purpose because it was able to take a heavy payload. And once we complet

No, Monaco is a I believe it's the it's a GMC RV and uh

dual axle can take a lot of weight. Once we stripped everything off it and just left the chassis itself, we redesigned or Greg designed this 18th century naval frigate. By the way, we kept the bathroom on it, the privy, because we always our previous AR car, one of the issues was the girls always had to go to the bathroom. So, as soon as you start cruising, one of them goes, I got to go to the bathroom. You're like, we just went So we have a woman's privy on board and um and so uh yeah it took uh six seven months tons of people helped and he brought that up and uh and we were able to sail it out in the desert. That's probably one of the neatest things of all. I can I remember

you actually sailed it like you it caught wind and it just push you along.

Andy I remember clearly saying to Gre Hey, what do you mean we're going to sail? I just want to look cool at 3:00 in the morning. He goes, "No, got to sail." So, he did it. It is almost a scale. And it is a sailing vessel. And we are able to take it out. You You can't sail inside the perimeter because of too many people would come running up.

Yeah.

And we can't control it. So, they let us go outside of the perimeter. We go out airport and then we go 10 miles. out into the desert into the pio and that's where we sail. And there's nothing better

than sitting there putting it in neutral turning off the music letting the wind fill the sails and feel that giant motor home list to the side and start moving. So as far as me looking cool in three o'clock in the morning, f*** that. That is worth it right there. Sailing in the middle of the desert just with a few people. And like Contessa, I think that was that was like a school bus that was uh it was built like round, right?

That's right.

Beautiful.

And that like didn't that it burned down or something? They uh left it up there. I believe it became um a art piece was on some property um which was I guess with a sympathetic owner. That property was sold and the new person didn't like it and immediately went out there and burned it down. I guess they shot it up. They did take the uh mast head off and I believe that's the only thing that survived, but I believe they got in trouble for because it was declared a art piece by the state of Nevada.

Oh, really?

Yeah.

Wow.

Oh, come Well, you got a lot of stories. Say 30 years. It's going to be this next year.

Yep. This will be This will be it. Final one.

What do you mean final one? Has somebody ever told me about

you? You know, it seems like all my friends go, you know, you say that every year and and I, you know, I do like, ah, gosh, it was so much work just working uh with the or not that it's difficult, but you know, getting all the shirts in line and trying to set up camp and and making it all happen, it's just it's uh it's I'm burnt burnt out. Yeah. Yeah. I mean I mean 30 years in a row I mean not many many people do that. I mean especially not many people who like don't don't you know not staff like working for the band.

I mean work like with them

last few years I I I it's there's the vibe isn't the same. There is a I don't want to say a disrespect towards the OGs that made it happen that spent all their hardearned money time and effort for us and now people are expecting them to do that and and money so much of an issue, you know, and and you know, people are getting paid. Well, s***, if I threw a party for 10 years out of pocket and then all of a sudden it became a huge success and I was able to make some money out of it, I think I'd bend the rules a little bit. I'd be fine for it. I have no problem with those people making money. And uh so yeah, I'm I'm all right with that part.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, uh, it's interesting that the current like, you know, monetary problems that the man has now. I mean, probably not going to go into all of that, you know, but like anything like you know, Bernie man is

it's probably what like almost like 40 years like old. I mean, uh, the first burn was like what 86 at the when Larry and Jerry James built their first burned their first man in Baker Beach. Right.

Right.

Yeah. But Uh like I was like talking to coyote and I was like yeah like how old were you when you did this? How old are you now? Like you know like how many years have you been doing this? And I was like that's like over half your life and he was just like oh yeah I mentioned the vibe and uh and every year I I'm I'm just as giddy as the virgin that goes. I enjoy bringing a new person because I'm uh I'm like Dracula. I suck the f****** enthusiasm of taking this person to a candy store. They've never smelled candy before. Imagine I don't eat any of the candy. I can't stand it, but I love bringing a person to a candy store has never seen them.

And that kind of feeling has lost now. I see. I think the cell phone f****** ruined it. When we went early on,

you went for a week and you had no idea what happened on the outside of the world. And frankly, you didn't really care.

Yep. Uh, and now you have cell phones everywhere and you got Instagram models coming up to art pieces and taking pictures and then posting that for their own benefit and never even taking the care

to talk to the artist that spent months and his own money to bring it up there for you to see for a week

and you don't even care to, you know, introduce yourself. This vibe is a little different, you know. Yeah, there's a lot of drugs there. There's a lot People are going just to get high, but that's not what it's about. And um and so

I decided to do something actually a little different this year, Andy. And I don't I don't know if I think I'm going to

want to get

Yeah. I you mentioned something about this like I don't I don't know.

So after 30 years of going, you'd always go with like a group of people or like you know be like almost like a little like village kind of with family. of friends. It's like then what are you going to do?

It's about 150 people. It's called Ply Pete's Plaza. I did not name it that way. Greg named it. Captain named it all those years ago because of uh as he said, I wasn't sure what was going to happen. So, I figured if we named it after you, we get better placement since everybody knows you and if something bad was going to happen, you get all the credit. Well, that completely backfired to this day. A lot People think I'm the captain of the ship. I don't think the captain likes that too much. And I point out quite regularly I'm not the captain. I am the head cabin boy and official spokes model. But uh uh I decided uh that I'm going to break away from the camp and I'm going to go over completely the other side. I've never stayed over two three o'clock area

and put myself so Polo. I'm going all by myself. All my friends will be there in their camps and I'll go visit them. But I'm going to set up by myself and I'm going to introduce myself to my neighbors as, "Hey, how's it going? Pete Alexander, first- time burner. So, how's this work?" And then I'm going to journal my meetings. I'm going to do short videos with neighbors. And I'm going to ask them three questions. The first one is uh what was it? Um what's your uh apply your name and where you're from and they'll tell me and then I'll say how many years have you been coming. It doesn't matter 0 to 25 doesn't matter.

Okay.

The last question is going to matter and that is who is Larry Harvey.

Well, you don't think everyone's going to get that?

I f****** asked that question to so many people.

I can't tell you. I would say this year 70% of the random people I asked had no idea. How's that possible?

No clue. I'm like, you're kidding me right now. No. No. Oh, look. Blinky lights.

Well, what? Like, how what else do they not know? I mean, I'm sure everyone like like must know like the whole the 10 principles. Even if they don't couldn't like, you know,

rattle off.

Would you be like, "Oh, 10 principles." They'd be like, "Oh, what's that?"

You know, granted, you go around, you get a lot of people, but I was surprised on how many times I'd asked that simple question. Hey, who's Larry Harvey? They had no clue whatsoever. But I'd be amazed right now with your listeners when you asking that question. They're going, "What the hell is he talking about?

Who's this Larry Harvey kid?" Like, "Yeah." Well, my very episode number one, I kind of gave like a basic kind of introduction to like to Burning Man and talked about Larry Harvey, the man who started it all. Him and Jerry James, you know, was it a summer solstice? It was like It was like in the summertime, right? It was like what, June or something like that, right? Originally. Yeah. So, he built I think together with like his kid or something like that and like other kids that they made this little like this rudimentary wooden man and hauled it down the cliff or whatever to Baker Beach. And then

I actually I actually heard this year the real story.

Oh yeah.

From legendary Flash at his uh Johnny Carson show.

Yeah.

Sitting there. watching it live and somebody asked the question uh two real interesting questions and the co-host I forget what his name was um he it was amazing first off Lakean the where the play is

yeah

when it rains it will it will soak up all that water and about 8 feet underneath that hard ply surface is the lake it's all mud if the lake gets more water than it can take it will suck an RV down. Did you know that? Yeah. Yeah.

Like like like the oldfashioned Gilligan Island like quicksand like is

Exactly. If there's enough rain on there, it will it'll sink. You'll it'll suck right in.

And then the other interesting one was

probably a lot of rain.

Yeah. The other interesting was about the man itself. When they actually had it, it was designed after the woman. woman that was uh I believe uh his significant other.

It was the romantic interest at the time. Yeah.

And can and they got around they started talking about it and they couldn't fathom calling it burning woman and so they changed it to Burning Man, but it was always a woman.

Really?

A lot of people don't know that. I found that out for the first time this year. Blew me away.

Really? That's quite interesting because Okay. Cuz wasn't I mean I guess one of the stories was that

burning woman. That's crazy. I would h I'll pass.

But didn't like Larry like break up with some woman and then he was kind of depressed and was like, "Oh, I'm going to make this thing and becomes like a catharsis thing and some other friend who is doing this kind of like pagan kind of burning like cleansing ritual thing at the beach and like I'm going to build this like well it was always a man, you know, to but now it's funny that it's actually was

it was a woman. It was

Was it Was it that woman?

Yeah.

Well, that is kind of weird.

Was that woman?

Yeah, that would be kind of weird. Like, hey, come on down to the beach. I just broke up with this girl and I made a wooden representation of her. I got to burn it.

Well, I think it was him and his close friends and they were all allies and agreed with it. And then various people who happened to be down at the beach said, "Oh, that's cool." And next thing you know, they did it the next year. It got to 60. And when it went to 800 people, the rangers showed up and said, "You're kind of going to do that." And they almost went ahead and did it anyway, but they didn't. They I think they dismantled it, took it down, and that's when the uh various members of the Cacophia Society said, "There's a place up in the desert in outside of Reno." And it went from 800 people down to 60. And those 60 went up there and burnt that man and came back and started it all.

That was 1990, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. 1990. Um. Yeah. So, how uh how has this changed your life? I mean, this has been like how old were you when you were first went in 95?

Well, I'm 64 tomorrow.

64 tomorrow.

I'm 64.

I'm 64 going on 27. Occasionally act 14 and often feel 94.

So, you must have went like so you bring was 30 years. So, it must have been 34, 35 when you first went.

Yeah. Yeah. I was uh pretty much, you know, seen and done it all as far as I was concerned. And then this fell into my lap. And like I mentioned before, it changed my life. Andy, it gave me the confidence to uh break away from uh Stinkfish and start my own clothing business, screen printing and embroidery. It gave me the confidence to be a husband and a father. Before I was married, I had no interest in having kids. And then it gave me the the the the confidence to have kids. And uh and my oldest boy goes with me now. Went with me the last four years.

You have two boys?

Yeah, two boys, Kai and uh Kenny. Uh I'll get Kai out next year when he turns 21. He's he's a little more reserved, but uh the older boy, he's like he's hooked. He's got half he's getting half a dozen of his friends to go this year.

I thought that was both your boys when I came out and saw you, but that was just your wife.

No, those were those were his friends.

Was that their first year? Both of them?

Uh, one had come the year before and then the other one that was his first year. And I brought Kenny out uh the his first time in 2001. There was no burn. There's only 2,000 people. And I go, "This is a perfect opportunity. to get him to feel what it was like for us in the early days. And it was raw. I mean, we rode motorcycles and had beers in our hand and you never even needed to put on the brake because you just went cruising by art piece by art piece and and it was just a blast. And

so that was the 2020 2020 Renegade burn, right? Or something.

Yeah, there was two Renegade burns. The first one I think got to be about 2,000. The second one hit almost 20.

Really?

Yeah. I remember It was COVID. Everything was shut down. People were not going anywhere. And the guy that sets up my camp, uh, Marky Mark, calls me up on the phone. He says, "Where are you?" What do you mean? He sends me a f****** picture. It's his entire Ply Peak camp set up in the middle of the desert and he's all by himself. And I go, "What are you doing?" He goes, "It's a lie. The town needs us. We got to spend money for Gerlack and Empire. Get your ass up here. I threw my bike and tent and sleeping bag and I drove up and and uh and then it just magically started happening. People came and he throws a hell of a party. So we were I guess we were like center camp and it was just magical. And then the next year uh it happened again and it just skyrocketed to two from 2000 to 20. That was the year we burnt the man. Uh everybody got really excited and they said, "Oh, we're going to burn him, man." And the sheriff and BLM and rangers all made it quite clear, nobody's burning a goddamn thing. You guys have you're not gonna have a get a hard time. I'll let you have a good time, but nobody's burning anything. There's no fires.

So, uh, sure enough, you get these hardcore burners that, uh, say, "Don't tell me no." And they build the man and we're watching. It's all halfass. And, uh, they're going to go trace it off about two, three miles. And then they're going to gather around and word grew and next thing you know everybody's heading off to go burn the man. And so we built a different one. We scadaddled two miles in the opposite direction. Laid it out on a couple of car hoods so we didn't have too much f****** move to back and uh waited and waited and then we saw the f****** fire light go up for theirs and then all the law enforcement and sirens and all was just blazing across the desert over there. And and then uh who was I with? With was Sid. Sid from the shark car. Legendary. He's f****** bad boy.

Lighter. And we uh I fire breathed onto the man and we set our own version on fire.

And then that was lasted about 20 minutes for all those law enforcement came over and we just sat around and gave him the old it was already on fire when we got here.

I don't know who put this here, officer. Wow. Yeah. I mean 30 years is quite a long time, you know. I mean, uh I took what like 11, no 13 years off or something, you know.

Came back. But uh

I don't know. I mean, I I hear this a lot from a lot of people, but you know, like been going a long time and like, oh, it's not like it used to be or whatever. But, uh I think what kind of keeps people coming back is like it's it's it's like it's connections, it's family, it's friends, you know, it's uh It's like, yeah, there there might be things that are not the same or, you know, definitely when things get bigger, everything changes and it's not as intimate, you know, and it it gets more bureaucratic, you know. I mean, it's things things definitely change, you know, but uh I think the core like what's still there is uh you know, it's family, it's friends, connections, you know. It's like even if you're going to be like camping off by yourself like out in you going to be like uh what is that like you be like way out in the back where like you like a walk-in camping kind of thing or like where like like a danger ranger used to do.

I'm I'm going to try to get as close to him as possible. But yeah, he's right up against the orange fence where the tent camping starts. And so there is this little section that uh runs parallel to the last street that you can park on. And so your backyard is this orange fence.

Yeah.

And I would just enjoy waking up for going to bed in that area and seeing nature. What I used to see all the time when I went, I never cared for living inside the city. I'm a country boy. I can go to the city. I come to San Francisco, but I don't want to f****** live in the Tenderloin.

Yeah. Yeah, that's me.

You know what? I I recall uh our first uh meeting when we did the pig. Remember the pig? uh like on the Playa or the one like at uh uh Decompression.

We've done a couple picks.

Oh, we did more than a couple, but

the one at Decompression for DPW and

we did the one up at uh up on the Playa and I believe that was the year the that you guys your whole Hawaiian Cal Kalapina

uh Capilina

was there and we had this uh this this pig that we started uh at about 4:20 in the morning and then

120 pound pig.

Yeah. Buttered it up all day long just brushing it and then they served it at 420 to you know whoever decided to show up and um I'll never forget first off these people came around the corner and were absolutely horrified at what got this big paintbrush. I'm just slopping on butter onto this thing and it it did look kind of like a human being, you know, over the top, you know, first impression, but if you put two and two together, well, they didn't. And they they were just disgusted by the whole process. Anyways,

did they really think it was a person or they just like like vegetarian?

They thought I said, "Well, this is what you this what did I say? This is what you get for uh this was it was a shirt cocker. Caught him on the But uh so we serve up the pig and everybody's happy. We had a live band. It was awesome. And then

Oh yeah, I remember that.

Roar go over the camp and I go, "What the f***?" And I go over and we had taken the pig and put it into a a large serving tray. It's probably 4 in deep and, you know, four or five feet long, three feet wide. And people just continually gone there, grabbed meat, and then before you know, it's just the skeleton in the head. And this beautiful girl walks in, had pushed the whole f****** carcass over the side, climbed into the vat of gristle pork and eaten,

rolled around, stood up and says, "Free licks everybody." And it was just,

bro, I people get lying.

Yeah.

At the end, I go I tell her, I go, "Man, I got to tell you, you made my party." And she goes, "Oh, you think so?" I go, "Yeah, that was great. She goes, "Are you gonna do it again next year?" And I go, "We're sure are." She goes, "Great. I have a sister."

Oh my god.

Yeah. I'm not sure if there was a Department of Health back then, but uh

that's when you could that's when we could cook anything for anybody and you didn't care.

Yeah. Well, no, that pig I remember people were like watching us like all day long. Like you said, it was like 12 hours, whatever. Just like I remember like Jeff with this big umbrella like in the hot sun, you know, just over this hot fire, this hot sun, you know, but uh there was like a line of like something like 750 or a thousand people like that pig

500. It was awesome.

Yeah. No, but that that pig went in like 15 minutes. So, it just like poof, you know.

We had quite a bit of food and it was a lot of fun. At the very end, I was completely exhausted. I just had it. So, I left and I came back. about 1 in the morning and I see a small group of people around the table where the pig is still left. It's it's you shouldn't be eating pig that it's spoiled by now. First off, there's nothing left. As Andy, as I start getting closer, I swear I hear this grunting like what the f***? And as I get closer, it's not burners. These are not Burning Man participants. These are f****** the Hills Have Eyes people, you know? They're wearing cowboy clothes and belt buckles and f****** they got their rusty pocket knife and they're cutting away at the head of the f****** pig. And I'm like, "What the f*** are you guys doing? Get the hell out of here." I'm scooping it into the garbage. You're going to get sick. You can't eat this s***. Unbelievable.

Yeah. Then there was one year, one of the pigs, I remember some some guys came up afterwards who were like had because we had the skull was there. And he's like, "Can can I can I please, sir? Can I have the skull?" And we're like,

"Sure, go ahead." You know, take take our poop away, you know? And then we're just like holding it above his head, like parading around like, "Look, we have the skull."

I'll never Oh, f***, dude. One of the worst things I ever seen or saw was uh I was walking around and um there there was a camp that had laid black plastic down on the play and they were having a a definitely a pagan ritual and the two 55gallon drums they had were filled with blood

and they were it was f****** f***** up dude. I was watching some bizarre s***. I was like they've gone too far. They reach into the f****** 55gallon drum all week long going back up. All week long at this camp I see two goats.

Wait a minute. Is he talking about the aesthetic meat? foundation.

No, no, this it this wasn't I don't think it was them.

Okay,

it it might be once we figure out towards the end what they

Okay,

so they had a couple goats that they were there. That was odd enough. It f****** brings an animal, you know? It's probably

This wasn't early on, right? Like

it was Yeah.

Yeah. Nowadays, you would never get away with. So, they brought a couple of goats and go, "Oh, yeah." And they f****** like spray painted them like pink and purple or whatever. It was just, you know, hair dye. It was off. So, late one night, I'm walking by their camp and I f****** see this weird thing going on and this dude reaches into this bloody barrel and he pulls out the goat's head and the eyeball the fur is gone. The eyeballs are staring at me. I'm like so this is too f***** up. And I left and I was just disgusted. And so I came back the next day and I go, "Hey, you know I I don't think that was right." And they go, "What'd you think?" And I go, "It was f***** up." And they go, Yeah, it's all fake. And I go, "What?" They introduced me and and Leo, the f****** uh goats. They never touched them.

One of the guys works at a butcher company. He brought the head. The blood was just water and f****** red dye. It was all show. And I'm like, "You guys had me good. I thought I watched a f****** animal sacrifice going on."

Yeah. Yeah. I've seen a couple of things kind of similar to that. There's one walking along esplanade and there was like it looked like a a person in like like like either like like latex or leather like a full full bodysuit but like in some sort of like you know tied up in some contorted like kind of position you know and I remember it was kind of bizarre you know was like out on the play and so you know me and my brother we go over and look at and this This guy kind of like walks over and he's just like he's like, "Oh yeah, no, don't worry. It's okay." We're like, "What? What's going on?" He's just like, "Yeah, no, she she's okay. You know, we're keeping an eye on her." You know, we're just like, "Oh, must be pretty hot in there." And like, "Yeah, you know, it was a safe word. Whatever." Like, and he leans over and he's like, "Ah, she's still breathing, you know." And we were just like, "Okay, this is really weird." You know, and then we're like, and we start thinking like, "Where? Like, are you sure is Is is she okay? Like this isn't like like I'm hot just standing here like it's like in leather like in this weird contorted position and it's like Yeah. We give her like a you know a little bit of water every few hours or so and we're like what?

Yeah. Yeah. And then like after like 10 minutes of like we kind of like uh I don't know man this isn't right. You know like like the guy finally was just like oh no no no no this is like this is a doll. This is not a real person. You know I think they actually had like a little like bellows thing so you could kind of see the see how see look she's breathing you know and you can see it like like

yeah that's all that's uh people do some crazy s*** I I saved some people uh last year when the rains hit uh there was a bouncy camp they had four uh bouncy houses

and when the rains hit um they uh deflated them and then at some point some people came by and uh had uh uh uh inflated it again and then started jumping around there and it was the rains had stopped but everything was all muddy and then somebody turned it off and it started deflating and they thought it would be funny to stay inside of it as it was deflating.

Oh

yeah I'm watching from my f****** camper just watching spectators and I'm looking at them going those guys are that's probably not a good idea and before you know it you hear that that f****** help. Help. And all three of them are stuck inside there. They would have suffocated in there if I hadn't gone over there and opened that f****** thing up and got them out of there. They would have been found.

Yeah. Some people do some stupid stuff.

Yeah.

On the back of your ticket, though.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's always kind of been that way, right? I mean, it's like you do risk the death, an injury, you know? I mean, Can't send off all those hedges, you know.

No. Safety third.

Yeah. So, what impact do you like you see like overall like Bernie man on your life even now looking like oh maybe you might not go like maybe you'll take a year off like you know go like uh hike you know the Rockies or something or whatever you know like

that's funny because I actually uh my goal is to do an even 30. I'm quite content not going next year. But I've always had a dream of hiking a part of the Pacific Rest Trail. I'm an avid backpacker and I would think uh picking one of the best parts of the Pacific Rest Trail and hiking it would uh be kind of nice. So that's part of me. I also wanna I also want to buy a sailboat and sail to Mexico. My little home away from home. Poncho, Mexico. This is

Oh, really?

Yeah. You wouldn't believe how many f****** burners I met down there wearing I'd be wearing something burning man and I'd literally run into somebody wearing something I printed

there's DPW gay rangers down in San Poncho Mexico

is that Baja what part of Mexico is that

no north of Porta about an hour near Salulita

ah okay

lot of burners down there they actually have a burn down there called the lady coconut that burn and YouTube it.

It's similar to what you guys do on on the beach, which to me is

Haven't done that in a long time. But yeah,

I think that what a better place to do Burning Man that at a beach where you can swim and watch Doll.

Why go to the moon?

Yeah. No, that was the day like Oh my god. Like back in the early 2000s, 2002, 2003, 2004 when we had these like beach burns on the west side of Aahu. It's place called Makua. And oh yeah, like the dolphins would swim by in the morning. You can go swim out with the dolphins. I mean, it was

Would you be able to throw the vent out there now?

Oh, no. No, no, no. Everything's different now. Like, but uh also like that Well, that whole area, it was like this valley and then the the road and then like on the road kind of cuts off the beach from the valley, right? And uh The valley is actually like a livefire training area for the army. So there's just this like little strip of like beach that you can kind of camp there, but it's not it's not really legal to camp there. I think it's you know you could use it during the day and and Hawaii has these kind of weird rules like if you're fishing you can kind of be there at night but you can't set up a tent and you know blah blah blah blah like but a lot of people would just it was kind of the country so it's like you know you know ain't illegal if you don't get caught kind of thing, you know, like,

you know, it's like if you go like in a small enough numbers and don't make much of a fuss, you know, then you could do it forever. And you know, it's like we did it for a couple years just like 30 to 60 people, no power, just acoustic, just do beach cleanups, and you know, we whatever we would burn like we would have like magnets and screens and we'd clean up like other people's like burn pits and stuff and it was awesome. It was just at the point when like there are other outside people who are like like the DJs came in and we're like no no no we want to bring like like uh generators and the music and and then and then it was like like a couple of hundred people and then that's when the like the authorities kind of found out about it like oh no you will not be doing that there.

Well uh let me ask you you went you went 11 years without going was that it 11

uh no I think it was 13 actually because I think 2011 was the last year, right? And then Yeah, because that was the year I did core. That was like kind of like my final project like and then um cuz yeah, my son was about what three years old then or something now. He's about like 16 and a half. But uh yeah, so I went this year 2024 stay.

What was the biggest difference? I have no concept of it because I haven't missed a year. Excuse me. But what is what was the biggest difference that you found when you arrived and you left and you walked away and you go, "Wow, this is what was the biggest impact that left?"

Well, because I've been following like everything as the years go by, you know, and then just like and like you said, it's like a lot of the stuff you see, especially on social media, it's like you see like the Instagram models and you see like the the glitzy pictures, you know, and you know, you get the stuff that's the stories that are kind of like pumped to you, you know, but it's I don't know. It's it's like the stories was kind of like like what you're telling me tonight about like the human stories like that. That's what's more realistic and and and real, you know, but uh definitely the size was different. There's definitely like more people. Although honestly, I think I kind of missed this interesting window like between 2012 and 2023, you know, I think like Bernie man went to, you know, what almost like like upper 80s, like almost 90,000 people or something. like a lot of like money came in a lot of.com like you know billionaire like money like big RVs big camps you know like you know pay for play like there's the whole like that then kind of like that wave kind of came and then kind of crest crested you know

yeah no that definitely what happened I think uh they

so this year yeah it was kind of I was like oh it's not that much different than what I thought

I think you're right it went down at uh probably went down to possibly the size where you were at or maybe a little a whole lot bigger. Yeah.

The first heat wave that came the year before the rains,

that was brutal. Even I had a hard I love the heat, but even I had a hard time. And then f***, the next year we get the the the rains and uh and then the two years off and that that was uh I'm sure that was a big hit for the org to take.

But how hot was that year? That was what 22, right?

I I would say it was in the hundreds and that means it's 110. And you know, anywhere else it's 100 in the shade and that's unbearable. A few degrees more, you would have been horrible. Doesn't sound bad, but when you're just sitting there and you don't have AC and even then all the AC's were going down because people were overusing them and it was brutal.

Yeah. No, I remember being out there sometimes when it was like 105, 110, but it wasn't, you know, it would kind of spike and hit that high and then kind of go back down, you know, but even at night it's like oh be 95 degrees like at night, you know. like

like sweltering, you know.

Yeah. Yeah. But I mean, there was there's subtle differences like I talked in a couple other shows, you know, like not not many different things like definitely a lot lot less smokers like like cigarette smokers, you know.

Yeah.

Well, that's that's because the vape came out.

Yeah. Yeah.

I you know what? I remember going for years. I It was f****** weird. I'd go to Burning Man and I'd stop by the gas station on the way and I'd buy two packs of Marboro lights because I'm f****** smoking those while I'm at Burning Man and I don't f****** smoke.

But at Burning Man, I'm smoking f****** cigarettes.

Yeah. No, Burning Man is kind of still like one of the I find like the last bastions of like the the few smokers that are actually left, you know? But even this year, like cuz I I haven't smoked a cigarette in like what seven 10 years. I can't even remember anymore. But But uh I I actually brought like I was at first I was like I'm going to bring a carton of cigarettes and that's going to be my thing. I'm going to go out and I'm going to give out cigarettes to everybody, you know, and my brother was like h a carton is kind of expensive. It's like ah you know you sure you want to do that? And I was like okay I'll just bring like three packs you know and so I brought three packs and then I I put on the bar of our camp and for like two three days it wasn't touched at all and I was like

what the heck? And so like I wrote on it, you know, it's like free. Please, please smoke me, you know, like like Yeah. And then like another day went by, still nothing. And I was like,

and then like this one guy like the one guy in the camp was smoking and I was like, you can smoke this? He was like, really? You know, like but they eventually did go like everything at Burning Man like uh towards the end of the week by like Thursday, Friday, Saturday, you know, people start like running out of whatever, you know, they're just like, "Oh, you got American Spirit Lights like

Yeah. I've uh I've often said uh you know it's all love and peace for the week and then you know on Saturday and Sunday everybody's offloading their food and you know

um

but you know and everybody's probably going this is beautiful this is awesome life should be like this and I would probably give it about three weeks and then it would be mass anarchy you know even me I'd be in my camp and I go you know Bill you've been coming in here every f****** day. Done a damn thing. You know, you leave your m everywhere. You know, you think you can help out a little bit and I'll let you have another steak or some more beer and then you know, no, you got to go and before you know, you can't give s*** out anymore because you got to keep it for yourself and anarchy would just take over.

Yeah. Yeah. No, I mean it works as a temporary city, you know? It's uh

you know, like in like Danger Ranger made that line drew that line in 1990 and everybody crossed over and it's, you know, it's the default world is on one side and this new magical realms on the other. But yeah, it's I guess it doesn't last. It's ephemeral. I mean, by design, it's like they burned them in so you could build it and burn it again the next year, right?

Surprisingly though, I think uh it stays with you. For instance, uh since the first time I I went, um I conduct my life differently. You know, it's the gifting economy. I I don't know how many thousands of shirts I must have given away. Probably a bad idea, but you know, um and and just being positive and not negative and cleaning up after yourself. And you know, you you look at the party, the festival event that we have, and you'd be tough to see where we left it. And you go to another big event like Coachella spending a week cleaning up that place and nobody even cares. It's a completely different mentality. And I'm I'm hoping I I see that uh again this year when I go and and kind of get that feeling of when I first went and uh been chasing the dragon ever since. And I

actually found the dragon this year. It was awesome.

Well, no, it's kind of interesting like what you're talking about like like bringing like a a newbie or someone for the first time and then kind of living vicariously, you know, I don't know, like you said, like chasing that dragon, you know, it's like you've been doing it 30 years and it's like you don't quite get the the same hit, you know, the the same thing, but you know, it's like, oh, if somebody new come like I don't know, it's interesting now next year you're trying a new thing, you know? It's like, oh yeah, well, yeah. I mean, but definitely you're gonna have to come by and hang out with us, too. Like, don't don't be a stranger.

Uh, no, I'll come find you. My thing with your car too, right?

What's that?

You have your car, too?

Yeah, I have Trixie, the pink fur car.

Yeah.

Yeah, I have Trixie. And uh I'll have her again. Um and then I'm going to make I don't know if I showed you the picture that I might have sent over to you. Plyipede does not exist.

Oh, yeah.

So, I stole that from Larry Harvey. That sign was above his door as you walked into his office 29 years years ago. And every time I walked in and I looked at that sign, I thought that's just f****** funny. So, I made a shirt and it said Larry Harvey does not exist. I made 500 of those. Gave them all away. Only certain amount of people, you know, know what that means. And they thought it was hilarious. And then probably the f****** claim to fame on that shirt is one day we picked up in the Monaco the first camp and Larry was on board and I was wearing the shirt. And I have a picture of me and Larry, me wearing the shirt with a big smile on his face. I've never made the shirt since. I don't think it's funny anymore, but I guarantee

Yeah,

I guarantee you Larry would. So, I took that slogan and I turned it into play doesn't exist. And if you come find me this year in my little hidden suare camp, I'm going to give you a shirt by Pete doesn't exist.

Wow. Awesome. Well, thank you so much, man. This has been awesome. Uh,

hey, are you sure? I got like f****** three more burn barrels in front of DMR to burn through if you want.

Well, I might have to come back for like PL like version two, you know? This is there's definitely more time for more stories, but uh it's getting getting late here now. But, uh, thank you so much.

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