"Try lying for a change, it's the currency of the world." - Dan in Closer

• Congrats to the Gunner on his recent success up north. You deserve it, young man.

• I leave tomorrow for Marietta (poker and friends), Athens (RCB send-off), and North Myrtle Beach (family vacation [read "working vacation"]) for a little over a week. Those of you who are expecting work from me shouldn't worry. My new toys will allow me to work... hopefully a little better than I've been working here.

• I learned two things today about the theme from "Sp0rtscenter":
1. It was originally the ID theme for the now defunct Satelli+e News Channel.
2. It was written by this person. Scroll down on her site if you want to know what she's most famous for.

• I have begun to learn recently that this town is a little more cutthroat than I had personally experienced. Though it's almost always polite, I'm becoming more acquainted with a deception in which people engage in order to hook you when you're needed and ditch you when something better is available. I won't lie and say that I'm okay with that. I'm not okay with that.

Nevertheless, I chose to play this game, so I'm not going to quit just because people prey on a nature that is probably a little too trusting for my own good. The truth is, people who need to use others need to use others. I wonder what happens to them when there's no one around to use anymore.

I intend to find out.

By the time I get back from several out-of-town engagements over the next two months, I will have lived here for almost a year. A year seems like a long enough time to decide to stop observing and start participating. I have thought I was doing that, but seeing what's going on around me I have realized that I am not.

I feel like the skinny kid who is sitting bored in right field in a kickball game. I think July is a good time to reveal that I have a razor blade in my pocket and my own ball at home.