(from the San Diego Burning Man mailing list)
Q: How many Burners does it take to change a lightbulb?
A: The fish.
A: None, LEDs, EL wire, and propane flamethrowers don’t use lightbulbs.
A: (pantomime) “Hey, I’ve got an idea!”
A: One to screw in the lightbulb. One to drive back to Reno to pick up the genny, one to string the cable, one to fire up the genny, one to put gas in the genny, one to put oil in the genny, several to sit around complaining about the heat, even now that it’s dark, several to recommend LEDs, EL wire, and propane flamethrowers rather than incandescent. Several to run around looking for the guy with the one connector you need to hook the genny to the cable, then realize they left that in Reno too, several to work out a “creative” connector, one to paint a big, pretty, “DO NOT TOUCH” sign for the creative connector. One to deal with the neighbors about sound complaints vis a vis the genny. Several dozen to contribute inequally to paying for the rental of the genny (“I hardly even was going to use much light.”). One to warn of possible lightening strike hazard.
A: Don’t have a lightbulb, Mithra ate it. Mmmph, tasty lightbulbs.
A: The lightbulb has to want to change itself. Change comes from within. We can’t be imposing our outdated misogynistic value systems on inanimate objects. Maybe we should just give the lightbulb some time alone to work this out.
A; Forget the lightbulb, run off to screw other campmates.
A: None, Dr. Random replaced the light bulb filament with UV LEDs and now it burns for years without having to be replaced.
A: Broken lightbulbs are really bad MOOP, especially broken blacklights that land on the floor of Xara and shatter into millions of little black bits that have to be meticulously picked out of the grass so people can walk barefoot there and goddess forbid you should actually replace that small piece of sod.
A: Burners don’t screw in lightbulbs, they screw in big piles of alkali dust in the middle of the road. Playa dust gets everywhere.
A: Dude, check out this lightbulb, it’s all sparkly.