[RebelYell]

Most guys show up at the ballpark three hours before a game. You figure a game takes three hours and then you've got the duties with the radio and press people and you've basically put in an eight-hour work day 162 days out of the year.

It's fun or I wouldn't do it.

Even more fun is the life on the road.

I've always enjoyed staying in motels. You can multiply how much I liked the minor-league dives by about 10 times when you look at the places we stay in now. There are about 40 of us counting all the players, the coaches, the bullpen catchers ... and the equipment manager.

I guess I'm the only one who knows about Charlie. I went down the hallway -- I love walking around these high-dollar places in just my shorts -- and peaked into a couple of the rooms where the doors were propped open. Most of the guys play cards. There's a too-rich-for-my-blood poker game every night it seems and there's a couple of young'uns who cart along their Playstations. I think a few of them have a football league or something and one of them is always playing Halo.

Charlie and a few of the coaches play spades most of the time. I don't know if it's for money or not. All I know is I feel kind of bad about this deal with him. He's a good man.

I even get this weird thought about who they're going to get to be the fourth man in their little game when Charlie's gone.

Tonight, our last night in Oakland before an early flight tomorrow morning, I made a point to stop and say hey to the spades game. Charlie was sitting across from the pitching coach and our two bullpen catchers made up the other team.

They seemed to be enjoying themselves with ESPN on the tube as they waited for the baseball highlights to come on.

I just gave Charlie a wink and he smiled at me.

"Things are going great, BD," he said.

"They sure are." And with that I nodded and wandered back down the hallway to my room.