I got a phone call at 4:30am Wednesday morning from the Alameda Police Department. They told me that my stolen car had been found in Oakland, slightly damaged, but not stripped. The words that came out of my mouth were, "Thank you." The words that wanted to come out of my mouth, but didn't quite make it, were, "Why the #$&*#&(@#$&! are you calling me at 4:30 am?!?!?!?"

I tried to get back to sleep. Maybe I did, but whatever sleep I got did not satisfy.

Next time my car is stolen, I'd prefer it stay stolen. Getting your car back sucks up a whole day of your life. First, I trudged off to the Alameda Police Department to get a "vehicle release form" from the agency that filed the missing car report. Then, over to the Oakland Police Department to stand in a stereotypical long, utterly bureaucratic and inefficient line for over an hour to get yet another "vehicle release form", from the agency which found the car. And then finally to the auto yard to which the car had been towed, to retrieve the car at last.

If there was anything efficient about my day, it's that the auto yard was about three blocks from the Coliseum. And since I was headed there anyway that afternoon...well, that was convenient.

Somewhere in there, I heard the awful news about Cory Lidle. By the time I showed up at the ballpark, I was already spent.

On a normal day, I suppose I would have been ready to promote Esteban Loaiza to #1 on my least favorite A's list for immediately blowing two leads he had been handed. I would have been ripping my hair out wondering why Ken Macha left Loaiza out there in a playoff game in the sixth inning when he was having a bad day, especially after Magglio Ordonez almost took him deep. I would have been cursing our fate every time D'Angelo Jimenez messed up a play that Mark Ellis would have made look easy.

But I was just kinda numb to all that negativity. It should have been a most agonizing loss, but oddly, I actually kinda enjoyed myself.

Perhaps I felt a sense of redemption, that even though the A's were losing, they were going down fighting. Things have not gone the A's way so far this series; the hits aren't quite timely enough, the defense always seems just half an inch from making a play, and the starting pitchers have let them down. The A's could have easily rolled over and let the Tigers just walk away with this game, but they slogged their way back into the game, with the help of some home runs by Eric Chavez and Milton Bradley.

When Frank Thomas came up, down by three, with the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth, I thought maybe, just maybe, that this long day would climax with a memorable, magical moment.

But, sadly, this was a day we were merely meant to endure, not to celebrate. Magic did not befit the day.

Thomas popped up, and that was that. I got into in my dirty old car, and we trudged back home together once again.