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Parking lot price: $50. Price we paid by simply parking at a metered spot: $1.50. Scalper website ticket price: Hundreds of dollars. Price we paid by simply calling ticket office: Face value. Above, Craig Sager says hello while eating a quick dinner outside Fenway Park.

Finally got a shot of Pesky's retired number outside the park. A 6 in the Red Sox font is not an upside-down 9. The way you can tell they did it correctly is to look at these three numbers. The top (smaller) hole of the 8 matches the hole in the nine. The bottom (bigger) hole of the 8 matches the hole in the 6. If you flipped the 6, you'd have a hole that's too big, and if you flipped the nine, you'd have a hole that's too small.

Over on Lansdowne, the new building is coming along. This used to be Avalon and Axis, but I think will be a House of Blues. ("Lowe's Presents the House of Blues"?)

Great sky over Fenway when we got there. My mom went off to get food and I tried to get balls in batting practice. Lots of close calls, but nothing. At one point some Ray went to give the crowd a ball but wouldn't give it to a non-Rays fan. He made people say "go Rays" to get it. One lady actually did it. She joins the "dead to me" list even though I have no idea who she is and will probably never see her white trash ass again.



Two more sky shots as the orange turned to pink.

Mom and I had two separate but equally awesome and unobstructed seats in section 24. Here was my view. It wasn't long before we were able to sit together....

The ALCS logo on the field.

Reflection of the field in the windows that face Yawkey Way.

Looking out onto Yawkey Way before the game. 1975, the year I was born.

Looking down at the concourse that runs underneath the third base grandstand.

Papi pointing skyward.

The TBS booth--finally a use for that space up there, above the space between bleachers and grandstand.

Trot Nixon threw out the first pitch. It's funny, a year ago in ALCS Game 7, I watched Millar throw out the first ball--and supposedly Trot was pissed since he was on the other team at the time. Good to see him welcomed back and willing to come back for this.

Dustin Pedroia hitting a near-dong that was caught.

After sitting among people who refused to clap or cheer, and spent more time texting than anything else, I finally went and joined my mom, since people left the blowout game, and we moved up even closer, eventually ending up in the second row. So the pics now become low-angle closeups. Here's Lowrie on deck.

Timlin on the mound.

Erick Aybar's brother and Carl Crawford's self.

JD Drew missing a ball.

Youk pissed at third.

JD Drew up.

Dustin Pedroia in the box.

Papi giving the crowd a ball as Youk does what people in pictures love to do--"looks on."

Joe Maddon.

The tray! So the game's almost over, we're down by double-digits, and the dudes around us are totally drunk but in the good, funny, "let's cheer really hard for a miraculous comeback" kind of way. They obviously, like us, moved down from crappier seats. However, this blazer-wearin' guy had this tray--a tray in the stands! That's a deadly weapon!--with strawberries and cookies. The drunken guys noticed this and were going nuts about the tray. I pointed my camera at it, leading them to high five me for documenting this ridiculousness. They then started chanting for the one guy to eat the one strawberry remaining on the tray--which I'll post video of later. So we did get some enjoyment out of this game....

Kevin Youkilis up.

Ben Zobrist on deck.

That dude that scored the winning run when Drew rolled the ball home the other night.

It was uni-rific being that close.

A Ray, up very close.

You know you're close to the action when you're looking up at the players.

Sean Casey gets in the game. Look at the Mike Lowell sign. What's with the sky? He's still alive, right?

Coco Crisp.

Coco on first, with Carlos Pena.

The view from row 2.

Jed Lowrie, with the umpire working on his novel.

Looking down into the temporary camera-well at a Japanese camera man's laptop.

And the Red Sox lose, a lot to a little. This Bay fan really went all out.

Blimp over Fenway on our way back to the car.