Apologies for the lack of posting in recent days, but in truth, I haven't watched a ton of baseball lately.

To hear tell, that may be a good thing.

How bad has our offense been? Plenty bad. But you probably already know that.

Masochists may gaze upon the unpleasant details in this here handy tally of utter suckitude.

Tom Hallion is as excited about Bartolo Colon’s promising outing as we are.

Either that, or he’s just watched The Naked Gun.

We'll be seeing this guy again soon.

And we'll see what this guy can do tonight.

Feeling pretty good about this team right now. You?

Now if only Manny can get the job done here before we head back out on the road.

Maybe the return of "¡Pega Luna, Manny!" will help?

Download it for free here.

OK, so this is how it went down.

Get home, sit down, and, as is my wont, start flipping between the game and Olbermann.

I’m paying only sporadic attention as I eat dinner and read a magazine, but certainly noticing that Jon boy is chugging right along.

Around the middle sixth, I see the Royals still haven’t plated a run. “Nice outing so far for Lester,” I remark to the Sox Blogette.

At this moment, I still have not processed quite what’s transpiring.

A bit later, she and I head out for a quick errand. On WEEI, Castiglione says something about the crowd just wanting to get through the bottom of the eighth and get on with things.

I’m so thick, I figured he was talking about the cold weather at Fenway.

Only then did it penetrate my muddled mind like a bolt from the proverbial blue.

HOLYSHITHESTHROWINGAFUCKINGNOHITTER

I’d watched Buchholz do his thing up in Maine last September, but this is the first time an event of such import was communicated to me via the AM dial.

Breath was held. Fingers were crossed. Radio static swathed the next four at-bats with the gauzy feel of the timeless.

A walk to start the inning.

Then a strike swinging and Pena quickly ground-out to third

A ball, a foul, a ball, a strike swinging, and DeJesus ground to first.

And then noodle-bat Alberto Callaspo stepped in as a pinch-hitter.

“These are the kinds of guys who ruin stuff like this,” I said.

But not this time.

Still not quite sure what to say, except the blindingly obvious. It’s been better said many times over already...

* He’s come a such a long way.

* He’s an inspiration to everyone.

* He keeps gilding his resume with stuff most guys, many much older than him, only dream of.

* He’s got the manager he deserves.

* To say nothing of the center fielder.

* And, of course, the catcher. (Four! Imagine if it was five?)

Three of the last five no-no’s in baseball have come courtesy of Red Sox prospects. (We’re making the Yanks’ much-vaunted youth infusion look piddling by comparison.)

And if Schilling hadn’t shaken off his captain last June, we’d be looking at three no-hitters in the span of 151 games. Pretty remarkable.

We are living in glorious times. What can one say? Not much else, except to echo one of Jon Lester’s teammates, as picked up last night by NESN’s camera: “Un-fucking-believable.”

(And no, I don't think that's grammatically correct, either.)

Bye, Joolz. At least we'll always have that time I saw you chowing down at the Boylston Street Burger King, mere hours before an important spot start against the Yankees.

You were so much more than a rubber arm with a servicable ERA. You were a friend to foreigners. You were a cold-blooded enforcer. You were helpful to your teammates. You were a dugout pet. You were a heckuva bowler.

And you will be missed.  

Best line so far from the SoSH appreciation thread:

"He seemed like a good guy to have around. Couldn't they have DFAed Lopez instead? Tavarez could come in and walk a lefty just as well as Lopez can." 

“I mean, I never walked eight guys in a season!”

Thus spake the Eck last night, expressing his bemusement and exasperation at Dice-K’s most unusual pitching line.

That’s true — three different times, in fact. (And, twice more, his last two seasons, he walked exactly eight.)

In fairness, of course, Mr. Mustache-Mullet put up those numbers as a reliever, not a starter.

(Speaking of Eckersley, by the way, this reenactment of his darkest hour is terrifically creative and very well done...almost as good as RBI Baseball Game Six.)

Anyway. Last night.

This is really weird:                         

IP     H   R   ER   BB   K

5.0    2   1     1      8     1

He got his fifth win, lowered his ERA, and took a no-hitter into the fourth — all while throwing the ball all over the damn place, allowing base runners at a ridiculous.

But he always wiggled out when it mattered. One wonders if, like it was in Japan, this could actually be a viable strategy for him if only there were no such thing as pitch counts here. (Alas, there is such a thing.)

It was excruciating to watch. But it worked. Our starter got the win, our closer got the save, our middle reliever got some seasoning.

Mikey Lowell was mere inches away from having a 4-5, 2 HR, 5 RBI night, and Ortiz just destroyed that ball in the ninth.

Hail, hail, the gang’s all here. Let’s see if we can keep these good things happening.

Last night’s game also marked the debut of the lovely Heidi Watney. I think she did a fine job. She seemed a little nervous, which is OK. But she did what’s expected of a sideline reporter. Some commenters I’ve read on a couple message boards seem to be demanding she offer the incisive commentary and encyclopedic baseball knowledge of a Gammons or a Kurkjian. This seems to me to be a ridiculously excessive expectation.

At Tuesday night's game, I remarked to the Sox Blogette that it seemed Jason Varitek hadn’t changed his at-bat music since at least 2003. Plate appearance after plate appearance: “Kryptonite” by Three Doors Down.

Then, on the very next night — I was lucky enough to attend twice in a row, thanks to the largesse of Phoenix staff editor extraordinaire Sean Kerrigan — I noticed that Tek had changed it up. Remarkable!

I couldn’t tell what the song was (and, truth be told, much like “Kryptonite,” I wasn’t much of a fan) but I wondered to myself whether this sudden shift in affairs might portend something big.

Lo and behold.

When Lowerie was gunned down at the plate in the bottom of the ninth — Vernon Wells having exacted his revenge for the butter-fingered indignity of the previous night — I grimaced.

Not so much for our failure to score, although that was bad enough. But rather for the fact that I had to pee. Really, really badly. I hadn’t had to go so bad since I was six or seven, unwilling to leave the theater during Return of the Jedi for fear of missing something good. I was in pain. I worried I was doing permanent damage. I needed a walk-off win toute d’suite.

And then Tek loped that single into center, just like Youk did last night. And then Manny booked it plateward, just like Papi did last night. And then we went bananas, just like we did last night.

And then I went to the bathroom. And all was right with the world.

Matsuzaka has found his groove.

Ortiz has found his swing.

Papelbon has found his arm-slot (to first).

And we've found our way back to first where we belong.