Transmitting from the Mojave Wilderness in Joshua Tree, California,

now is the time for Desert Oracle Radio, the voice of the desert.

Night has fallen on the desert I was behind the wheel

a couple hours out of Los Angeles

The wind knocking around the semi-truck trailers

Whispy clouds whipping around San Jacinto.

Flipping through the satellite radio channels, feeling all right, pretty good, not bad, can't complain.

Gene. Pretty good, not bad, can't complain. Gene Watson singing

hockey talk, old dirty bees, swearing

poetry, the golden hour giving way to maybe

one last blast of cold winter wind,

an unreliable specter of precipitation.

Gassing up at the Morongo Casino, always support your local tribe, and then the last stretch open road to the 62 just got to

find a notch between the big rigs and the right-hand lane safe as in your mother's womb up the grade maneuvering through the tourists making way for the hot rodders ever

cognizant of the fact that every couple of times you come up this canyon.

There's a dozen Marine Corps vehicles splayed out over half a mile of right lane.

Highway flares and young grunts standing guard.

Why do so many of their vehicles break down?

Is that part of the training?

I mean, if they can't get between Camp Pendleton and 29 palms

without half the transports failing along the way

we might need to revisit our national defense strategy.

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