Worst of all, Scribner, who plans to publish this book, had set up an interview with Bob Minzesheimer of USA Today at the ballpark, along with a photographer who took pictures of Stewart and me until every Yankee fan in our immediate vicinity[57] had gotten a good gawk and a chance to boo. I have decided that hell is probably an endless photo op at an opposing team’s ballpark where your club is getting its fudge packed most righteously, to the great glee of the sellout crowd where you are not being allowed to hide like the microbe you would dearly love to be.

At last we were allowed to escape, and could I have written all that yesterday? Technically, yes. It was a Saturday-afternoon game, and I had plenty of time later on to jot these fan’s notes. Emotionally, no. I was too bummed out. And the bottom line? The ironic bottom line? After all the emotional highs and lows of the last two games, the Boston Red Sox are exactly where they were before coming to New York. Yes! We’re three and a half behind in the AL East, and thanks to an Angels loss to Texas yesterday, we are five and a half ahead in the wild card. So in the end, it’s just two more games off the ever-diminishing schedule.

Ah, but this afternoon comes the cherry on the banana split: Martinez versus Mussina. 1:05 P.M., at the Stadium. Wonder if I could scalp myself a little ticket to that game?

Hmmmm.

Later: I did, and Pedro was awful. The Red Sox were awful. The New York fans were loathsomely jubilant. I paid $350 for a box seat and watched the Yanks put an 11–1 pounding on my Sox. This afternoon, even the sunshine was awful. It was, in many ways, the apotheosis of the Dark Side Red Sox fan experience: the Red Sox fan not as Fearless Booster of the Underdog but as Beaten Loser, slinking from the park with his head down, eager to put the sound of those cheering fans behind him and clinging to the twin tenets of the Manny Ramirez Credo for comfort: Turn the page and We gotta jus’ keep goin’, man.

Tomorrow, Wakefield faces the Birds at Fenway Park. I hope, because I am faithful. I fear, because I know that when you’re going bad, you usually get more of the same.

The best news is quiet news from the West Coast: the Angels are also weekend losers, and we’re still five and a half games up in the wild-card race. On that side of the dance card, it’s just two more games off the schedule. But yes, I fear the Orioles, with whom we have gone 1-4 so far this season at Fenway, where we have won so many against other teams.