You see them around town in early September: cars covered in playa dust like four-wheeled powdered donuts with bike racks. Eye contact with the driver usually reveals, in the flicker of time before a red light turns to green, an expression that conveys, "Oh my god I totally just did mushrooms in the desert and had sex with my friend's sister in a tent, then lit a bunch of stuff on fire and took some new Myspace profile pics."

If you've journeyed to the Black Rock desert in late August for Burning Man, chances are you know the bittersweet pain of taking the Subaru to the car wash. And if it's October and you're still wistfully finding phone numbers and tofu jerky in the pockets of your backpack, soak up some Burning Man nostalgia at this Saturday's Decom event in downtown L.A. See, "decom" is playa language for "decompression," because after you've spent a a year tricking out your bike with shiny stuff, then sleeping in a poncho for a week, its hella hard to get back into the grind of your Web design job. L.A. Decom gently ushers you back into the realm of the bathed and reconnects Burners with their new friends—whom they may or may not recognize without the loincloth. Or more accurately, with pants.

And for those who don't have hundreds of dollars to spend making the pilgrimage to the middle of nowhere each year, this local, one-day event gives you a chance to wiggle a toe in the Burning Man waters to see what—and whom—you're missing.

Street-clothed squares get in for $15, but it's only $10 if you're walking art (see "loincloth," above). Expect super-friendly people—no, we mean suuuper-friendly—a mind-boggling array of installation art, maybe a few fire dancers and perhaps some vaudeville-type performance art. We're into it.

L.A. Decom takes place at Mateo and Palmetto streets downtown on Saturday,Oct 13, from noon to 11 p.m, though folks will be "decompressing" at DJ Wolfie's $20 afterparty at 225 E. 5th Street (just west of Los Angeles) into the wee hours.

Alie Ward is Events editor for Metromix Los Angeles.