Introduction

[AUTHOR'S NOTE: This story originally appeared, in slightly different form, on Ruthie's Club, accompanied by two delightful manga-style illustrations by Lady Neko. I'd like to thank Ruthie for patiently working with the rather tempermental author on beating the story into shape. I'd also like to thank The Wolffman and Selena Jardine for their help with an earlier draft.

Ruthie was originally planning to run it in late September, but I asked if it could go up for the last week of August instead-a wish she happily granted. It was important to me because that was the week of Burningman. On that week about thirty thousand cyberpunks, aging hippies, unemployed dot-commers, artists, rave kids, musicians, gawkers, unicyclists, fire-breathers, and assorted freaks were converging on the Black Rock Desert in northern Nevada for the Burningman arts festival. There, they built a city and, at the end of the week, tore it down. They had parades, parties, poetry readings, puppet shows, public spankings, and pillow fights. On Saturday, with much ceremony, a fifty-foot wooden effigy of a man will be burned. They whooped, danced, threw things on the fire, packed up, and finally headed home. Ruthie asked me to include a note about what the Burningman festival is all about. Ruthie, if I knew, I promise I would tell you.