The drinking started before noon, lunch consisted of beer and peanuts, and my arms and nose are sunburned - yes, it was Opening Day and I celebrated by ditching my cubicle for a seat at Ameriquest Field in Arlington, where the Red Sox were taking on the Rangers. It was a perfectly sunny 80 degrees in Texas when Curt Schilling took the mound just after 1:05pm.

One of the many questions surrounding this year's club is how Schilling will look 17 months after surgery and 6 months after the end of a disappointing season in which Schilling finished with a 5.69 ERA. Yesterday, Red Sox fans got a good look at just how dominant a fully healthy Curt Schilling can be. After throwing 117 pitches, 79 strikes among them, Schilling retired to the dugout with a 7-2 lead and the satisfaction of knowing that the previous two injury-riddled seasons in which his mechanics were never quite right are finally behind him. Schilling, who claims he feels as good as his did in the 2002 season, when he was a Cy Young runner up, gave up five hits, two earned runs, and walked one in seven innings.

Another hot topic is how successful the plethora of new guys will be at replacing the fan favorites they have replaced. Though one game is too small a sample size on which to judge, yesterday's game was certainly a good sign of things to come. New third baseman Mike Lowell silenced naysayers with his eighth inning homerun, centerfielder Coco Crisp scored two runs and made a couple of tremendous plays in the field, and second baseman Mark Loretta doubled in a run in the fifth and turned in an incredible at-bat before Papi bashed a homerun that measured approximately 789 feet.

Beer, sun, and Papi rounding the bases - it's officially summer, no matter what the calendar says.
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Top 5 Moments of The Game

1. "Chan Ho Millwood, clap clap clapclapclap"

2. The female Rangers fan who thought it was a good idea to talk shit to 60 Red Sox fans before the game. She and her cowboy hat and denim daisy dukes were gone by the 4th inning.

3. Turning Ameriquest into Fenway South with stirring renditions of Sweet Caroline and Dirty Water in section 41.

4. The Mark Loretta at-bat. You know which one I mean. I said it when they signed him, and I'll say it again - this dude is the most underrated second baseman in the league. He's like Mark Bellhorn minus the mind-numbing volume of ill-timed strikeouts. And the pot.

5. The sweet clang of the ball off of the foul pole right above my head followed by the sight of Papi rounding the bases.

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Last night's Yankees/A's game was only fun for about 10 minutes. Then, Barry Zito bent over and the Yankees made him their bitch, tagging him for seven runs in 1.1 innings. But, the highlight of the game for Sox fans came in the bottom of the third. With Kotsay on first and Swisher on second, Bubba Crosby flied out to center. Damon made the routine catch and then introduced Yankee fans to his noodle arm with an embarassing throw that prompted the announcers to note, "Well, the Yankees certainly didn't bring him here for his arm."

Meanwhile, Boston fans will be seeing things like this for the next few years: