How many total hours were you at Burning Man?
60.

Did it seem over-commercialized?
Nope. Any kind of vending, money, or use of logos was strictly prohibited. Often, people who rented campers and box trucks would cover the logo on the side with a tarp.

What surprised you?
The scale of the event. 40,000 people were out there and we formed a literal city. Once when I was able to get to an elevated vantage point, it was obvious that this thing was the size of Lower Manhattan. It was a mile or two across -- I only saw a fraction of it. I had no idea exactly how expansive it would be.

What sort of food did you cook?
My friends Jeff and Margot brought all the food and I brought the backpacker's stove. For breakfast, we ate granola bars, almonds, and dried fruit. For lunch, salami sandwiches or Ramen noodles. And dinner, more Ramen, and once we cooked pasta with a vodka sauce, and another time beef stew from a can (which was my favorite meal). I have a hard time remembering when we ate each meal because our schedule was so screwy. We just ate when we were hungry, which was non-stop.

What did you pack that you DID NOT need?
Amongst many things, the most obvious unneeded item was the giant rubber horse head, which I thought would make a great costume. But, as it turned out, it was just too hot outside to wear comfortably.

What should you have packed that you REALLY needed/wanted?
A better variety of snacks that I could have kept in my pockets; Replacement bike tubes;

What were the two coolest things that you saw?
1. Uchronia, aka the Belgian Waffle, a gigantic wooden sculpture out in the desert that also served as a dance spot at night. I heard people who've been going to Burning Man for many years say that not only was it the coolest thing this year, but the coolest thing in the history of the event. The creators Jan Kriekels and Arne Quinze, along with 90 volunteers, built the installation with lumber and equipment they shipped over in 10 semi-truck containers several weeks beforehand. The rumor is that it cost $400,000 -- which I think is probably an underestimation. Here's a video I made and here is another (cool night scenes). Plus, here's an interview with the creators.

2. Mutant Vehicles. If you brought a vehicle to be driven in the city, then it had to be approved by the Bureau of Mutant Vehicles (ha!). To qualify, it needed to be special. Most of them looked like parade floats. A handful were incredible sculptures in their own right. Here's an example. The most fun were the giant buses modified to be clubs, with bars and dancefloors. At night, they would start up and cruise around playing loud dance music. Ever so often, they would stop to let people on and off, and others nearby would gather around to dance to the music for a few minutes. This year, there were 175 mutant vehicles total.