_{(With apologies to William Shakespeare)}

To bus, or not to bus. That is the question —
Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous tedium,
Or to take arms against a sea of terrible games,
And, by opposing, end them? To quit, to sleep—
No more — and by a sleep to say we end
The heartache and the thousand spattered bugs
That game is heir to — ’tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wished! To quit, to sleep.
To sleep, perchance to dream — ay, there’s the rub,
For in that sleep of quitting what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this Sega CD,
Must give us pause. There’s the respect
That makes calamity of so long a marathon.
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
Th’ highway’s length, the wheel’s necess’ry justments,
The pangs of despised hours, the end’s delay,
The insolence of comments, and the spurns
That patient merit of th’ others take,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a pulled plug? Who would travels bear,
To grunt and sweat with a sweaty gamepad,
But that the dread of never helping children,
The undispensed charity from whose bosom
No comfort issues, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those roads we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus the Moonbase does make donors of us all,
And thus the loading bars of livestreams
Give way unto the pale cast of the room,
And an enterprise of great pith and moment
With this regard makes ready our captive eyes,
As once again, we run to Vegas.

Or, you know, back to Tuscon. Depending on what hour it is.

Loading Ready Run‘s Desert Bus begins tomorrow.

_{(With apologies to Lewis Carroll)}

The time has come, (the Alchemist said)
To talk of many things:
Of busses — and cards — and handmade-crafts
Of children and of kings.

Once a year they gather there,
A fanciful base on the moon –
(Granted, we know it’s actually Canada,
but don’t spoil it so soon!)

They sit upon their bean-bags and couches,
Displayed for all of us,
For that great and humble event we love,
The one called Desert Bus.

From Tuscon to Las Vegas is their digitized route,
Displayed on Sega CD.
Since Penn & Teller decided (for the lulz)
To make a non-violent game, you see:

There are no bullets, no cars, no rockets,
No prostitutes or pimps.
Just drive and drive and drive some more,
Until you weep like simps.

“What purpose?” you ask? “What’s wrong with them?
“Why do they do these vids?”
The answer’s as simple as it is heart-warming:
They do it for the kids.

As long as donations and auctions abound,
The crew will play the game.
Could be for days or weeks or more,
To them it’s all the same.

They’ll sell hand-stitched crafts of all kinds,
Things mythic and beyond,
They’ll laugh, they’ll cry, they’ll drink Red Bull,
And with us they will bond.

Watch and donate, for the children,
for the auctions and the fun.
Brave as they are, they can’t do it alone,
That crew from Loading Ready Run.

Here it comes now! I hope you’re ready!
There’s room for all of us.
Join us, won’t you? The time has come
to ride the Desert Bus.