There's something about summer -- the coconut smell of smeared suntan lotion, the lazy urge to dodge obligations with a dreamy smile, the smell of briquettes doused in lighter fluid -- that cries out for a road trip. Even now, as a supposed adult who (sadly) isn't entitled to a full three-month romp this time every year, that tingly feeling of nowhere to go, nothin' to do, and miles of time to do it in is an irresistible siren's call.

Best to just gas up the car, fill up the cooler with plenty of water, snacks and soda-pops, and head on down the highway. Of course, no road trip may be undertaken without a carefully selected batch of traveling music. This decision cannot be underestimated: The audio choices you make impact every mile of road you drive.

	Woe to the weary traveler who finds only tapes that lull them to sleep -- and perhaps an early grave -- when what's needed is a jolt of raucous rock to pry the eyes into a wide open position. And the grief when the fatigued driver longs for a respite from noise, and can find only headbanging anthems, is too horrible to contemplate. What's important is to find a happy medium, to make up your own medley, create your own soundtrack with care to include a little bit of this, a little bit of that.

Sure, talk radio is all well and good, as is checking out the local stations, but a time will come when you're driving some long lonesome road only to realize that the sole signals the radio picks up are the Jesus Saves preacher and some maniacally happy duo promising listeners fabulous prizes. So, like the Boy Scouts so pithily advise: be prepared.

For the road trip just passed -- a jaunt from San Francisco to San Diego with Mr. Right in the passenger seat -- much thought went into tape selection. Although there was a time when Mr. Right was as involved in the music scene as is possible without being famous, he has left all that behind, thus leaving all musical choices up to me. (Which is a damned good thing, given that it's my car and I was doing all the driving, which means that I hold absolute power over everything that goes on in that vehicle, which emphatically includes the stereo. Not that I'm a control freak or anything.) Ahem.

So, as I was saying, be sure that the tape selection runs the gamut. For contemplative moments, I included two volumes of Atlantic's recent John Coltrane collection. For sheer hit-the-road-running energy, I tossed in a tape with surf guitar legend Dick Dale on one side and the remarkably swell "Pulp Fiction" soundtrack on the other. For singalong moments, the Beatles' "White Album" served quite nicely. And just to annoy former punk rocker Mr. Right, the Carpenters tribute was a must-have.

Of course, mix tapes are the way to go on road trips like this one, which feature hours of driving through scalding air, little scenery of interest and dodging hundreds of malevolent truckers. For this journey, I whipped up a brand-spanking-new tape, one with some of my favorite driving songs on side one, and, of course, a tasteful selection of ditties from The Damned, Agent Orange, and The Clash on the other, for you-know-who.

As usual, my side of the tape was sadly lacking in the segue department, finding Joan Osborne tripping over Nirvana, and Tom Petty incongruously perched next to Devo. This is mostly because I tend to get so excited about the next song on any given tape that my entire brain shuts down when mixing it up. Which leads to some clunky listening experiences, but hey, any tape that has Dramarama's scream-along "Anything," Siouxsie Sioux's quite respectable cover of "The Passenger" and Patti Smith's "Free Money" on it is enough to make me forget that my butt's gone numb and there are still 200 miles to drive before I sleep.

Crank it up and drive: That's what summer's all about. Go vroom, windows down, music up, singing so loud and off-key that you scare small children in passing cars. Ahhh. Road trippin', baby.