The streets were empty. It was a late night, and a young black boy strolled casually down the middle of the lanes, walking and weaving in and out of solid black stripes painted over golden asphalt as he dribbled a fully inflated basketball. The mood was grim. If you didn't know it was Heaven, you would swear it was Florida.

My favorite hangout in Atlanta had its final day of business this past Sunday. Here are a few of the photos I took as lots of people gave P'cheen International Bistro & Pub a proper sendoff.

Today is the annual semi-holiday when everybody goes WorldStarHipHop and watches men injure themselves for money, more money, and the chance to kiss a carved glass football. I'm just as guilty as you for letting that dominate all. But I heard bad news, and it sucks. So let's pause just long enough to say some good words before we go back into celebrating American brutality in the name of competitive "sport."

Regardless of who was actually responsible for the snow (God), weather predictions (meteorologists), Atlanta traffic (population growth/outdated infrastructure/racist politics/Cobb County/rural Georgia voters), readiness and maintenance of interstates (Governor Nathan Deal), late closing of schools and shutdown of school buses (school superintendent), everyone's blaming Kasim Reed for this whole ATL #SnowJam2014 thing. I know why.

"The system's broken -- the school's closed; the prison's open."

OK, so obviously I made that quote up, but at least that seems to be the message being sent to patrons of the Camp Creek Marketplace, which was once a moderately progressive shopping center (sushi and hibachi in East Point!) just down the street from the world's busiest airport, Hartsfield-Jackson (ATL).

Here I was thinking we might get a Trader Joe's or something at the Marketplace. Ha! Back to reality. It looks like the bean-counters are saying they've done the math, so don't even think about stopping by the former Barnes & Noble space looking for a nice long read to take on your next international flight. Actually, don't think, period. Just go buy fake hair at the newest location of BeautyMaster, "The Largest Ethnic Beauty Shopping Site in North America!"

That's right--books are dead, at least on Camp Creek. So just buy some hot glue and either some remi, yaki or that good Indian hair. Unless you're going to India, where apparently they just might catch you slipping on the bus, cut that bullshit off your head and resell it to someone who buys in bulk just to turn around and sell it to a business in East Point which'll then sell it to someone just like you. The circle of life.

Whatever... just slap that crap on your head, because you're worth it.

You can find out what the people think of the business that replaced the only bookstore I can think of in Southwest Atlanta with a weave megaplex by either clicking that "Photo Credit" link next to the image at the top, or simply by visiting Yelp. Here's what Yelper "Diedre R." had to say on a different page dedicated to BeautyMaster:

So yeah, don't expect too much outrage or anything, especially with all that "99cent jewlery" available, yo. The irony is in that beige bar at the top that says it's "in English." Headcrack!

But back to the real side of things, this is pretty sad and pathetic. Feel free to discuss. Shout out to East Point City Councilman Alexander Gothard and Jeffrey L. Anderson for sharing this image.

You'd never believe this shit, but there is a such thing as journalistic integrity. When you're credited or recognized for having it, you've usually shown that you are careful to only report facts, able to remain as objective as possible, and those kinds of things. One major no-no is taking money for your content without stating to your reader that you're doing exactly that.

Hey, bills. They've gotta be paid and all; I get it--I get it. But there is a long-standing model for how you do this. Major newspapers, magazines and websites have been doing this for much longer than blogs have existed. All you basically do is have some way of alerting your reader that what they're laying eyes on has been purchased.

Why does it matter? Simple, really. When you buy something, you own it. If you own something, you control it. If you control the message, you usually don't follow anyone else's rules, although there's no rule saying that you couldn't follow them if you wanted to do such a thing--it'd be weird and strangely altruistic, but pretty awesome as well. Of course this doesn't happen often.

So when a hip-hop blog, which was once the premier source for quality underground and mainstream music, decides to just all of a sudden start dick-riding Moet & CHandon, well, it's kind of depressing. Not just because it's written in a very lame manner by the well-respected founder of the website, but mostly because never once does he come on out and say he's being paid. And really, is this bottle really that nice? Not that I'm an authority on Champagne bottles, but really. It's pretty loudly out of place, and by linking to Moet's Instagram account--twice--Eskay is damn near pulling a hamstring bending over to touch his toes for the brand that's quietly backing him up on this (I mean financially, of course).

Now, have I ever written about new alcohol products or packaging designs? Maybe. Hell, I'm drinking wine now, so I'm not exactly of sound-enough mind to recall, thanks. But have I ever been paid for doing so? Nope. As someone who  attended media tastings and knows what these folks ask "journalists"(bloggers) to do in return for their invitation to the free food-n-drank event (and future invites, ahem...), I can tell you that Eskay is doing exactly what a publicist or marketing rep wants him to do just by the language and links. NahRight is too big of a brand (or at least I thought it was) to be doing this kind of stuff for free. Eskay may be reckless by drunkenly putting overpriced bubbly ads, cloaked as content, in between posts about rap artists Hopsin and Roc Marciano (I know..., "Who?," right?), but yeah, I guess I'm hating or something...

Anyway, read the post here; tell me if you think I'm just tripping. Better yet, tell Eskay in the comments of his blog. He could use the feedback (not as many comments these days), and I wouldn't count on my comment passing approval...

I am not here to recap the desolate and dry reality of this pitiful excuse for a carnival. I will not discuss how I was gypped (ha! because carnivals are run by gypsies!) for an extra dollar because they charge for two people if an adult has to accompany a child that's too short to ride an attraction by his/herself. I won't even revisit the fat woman on the concession cart who tried to charge me $5 for a caramel apple when the sign right in front of her said it was $4, and she still tried to stick to her spoken price.

I will merely turn this blog post over to my special correspondent, The Booger Bear, who will narrate a slide-story of images taken yesterday at Downtown East Point's carnival. The journalism is in her facial expressions, and the story is clear: East Point's carnival SUCKS.