Anybody going to the Smoke Farm Symposium?
posted August 24, 2017 10:58 PM   RSS | iCal | +googleCal

Sat August 26 at 11:00 AM, Smoke Farm
12731 Smokes Rd, Arlington, WA, USA (Map & Directions)
The Smoke Farm Symposium (think left-inclined TED talks in a barn, followed by a tasty communal dinner) is on Saturday in Arlington, WA. This seems up MetaFilter's alley and I'll be surprised if no one else here is attending. I decided at the last minute to go by myself. Anybody else planning to be there?
posted by centrifugal to Presentation (7 comments total)

No, but I've been there for Lo-Fi as an artist, and it's a pretty amazing place.

I also strongly recommend going and buying the biggest, nastiest can of DEET mosquito repellent you can find and bathing in it like it's Hai Karate, it's 1977 and you're going to the roller disco in a rhinestone leisure suit.

Last time I was there the skeeters were so huge and so prolific that if you ran around with your mouth open you could probably strain them out of the air like a baleen whale eating krill and survive. Oh, and I watched them carry off a goat. Mosquitoes usually leave me alone but I'm pretty sure I lost about a quart of blood that weekend. I had bites inside and behind my ears and even on my scalp.

Let me put it another way: The mosquitoes were so bad that I drew up a plan for an art installation for the Lo Fi fest that would use them as a terrible in-joke.

It would be an environmental installation featuring a back-lit scrim about 10 feet tall and however wide, behind which would be a series of convoluted ducts spelling out the words "COME CLOSER" Behind those ducts would be a CO2 generator and/or another chemical mosquito attractant, so that they hopefully nearly black out the backlit scrim wall to darken in the words well enough to be read from a distance.

Besides being a horrible trap for humans, my thinking is if I can attract as many mosquitoes as I can to the installation I may cause there to be less of them everywhere else, or I could even maybe set up some bug zappers or mosquito traps behind the scrim wall to turn it into a rare functional environmental art installation.
posted by loquacious at 1:04 PM on August 25, 2017 [3 favorites]


OMG, this always happens on the worst possible weekend. I really wish I could go. Next year, maybe.
posted by palmcorder_yajna at 1:06 PM on August 25, 2017


MOSQUITOES ? EAT GARLIC. RUB GARLIC ON SKIN & HAIR. IF ALL ELSE FAILS, WEAR SPACESUIT.
posted by y2karl at 4:04 PM on August 25, 2017


Oh, yeah, I've been to this before and the mosquitoes are very...assertive. I just always hope someone they like better than they like me is nearby. (But they like me very much. One bit me once on the subway under the East River in January.)

The barn didn't get buggy last time I was there, at least.
posted by centrifugal at 4:15 PM on August 25, 2017


Looks like there's no tickets left, or I'd consider it! Have fun!
posted by corb at 5:47 PM on August 25, 2017


I think the mosquitoes mostly stay away from the barn/dining hall building because it has good sun exposure and wind exposure. And when people are there there's usually a cooking fire going on and maybe a bonfire in the big ring.

They swarm and churn like flying miniature piranha in the meadows, near the river and few brooks/hallows that run around the lower parts of Smoke Farm.
posted by loquacious at 6:23 PM on August 25, 2017


I'd be definitely down but am still on my amazing eclipse/nerdcation in Oregon. To clarify, my kids now each have their own favorite nebulas and galaxies, their own favorite raptors, and their own favorite volcanic peaks of central Oregon.

Maybe next year?
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 7:36 PM on August 25, 2017 [2 favorites]



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