Nobody Guesses Destiny

Materialism, a deepening shadow: “In California lore there is the story of a 1940s gang that operated profitably on the sun-blistered highway stretching between Lost Angeles and Las Vegas. The gang would steal orange cones from a street maintenance crew and distribute them in a gentle curve across the highway in the middle of the desert. Travelers driving to Las Vegas were detoured onto a dirt track that eventually petered out in dust and greasewood, and there they would be ambushed and robbed by four men with machine guns and sent reeling back to Los Angeles in their underwear.”