It was a pleasant experience on a lovely day.

The timing for such a warm-hearted piece would have been helped immensely had the Mets not base-ran themselves into a 1-0 loss, and had Billy Wagner not thrown lighter fluid onto the fire afterward.

Oh, well. Much more on all this in the blog on Friday, where I will include quotes and observations for which there was no room in the paper.

For example . . . 40 years from now, will middle-aged fans be as nostalgic about the cheap seats in the upper deck as people like Gary Cohen, Howie Rose and me are about Shea?

Citi Field has only 42,000 seats, and they are designed to be more scarce (and thus more costly) than Shea's ever were.

Sigh.

I don't have time to think of something clever to write about this news.

Check out the latest Scott's Shots on the never-ending Spygate saga and the unfortunate role in it played by the Boston Herald.

OK, I'm out.

Enjoy "Ugly Betty." See you Friday.

Meanwhile, read our other fine blogs, especially Rieber's so he leaves me alone.

She's No. 1 in the world, right now!

But later I realized it had more to do with her nationality, which is not American, than it did with her sport.

If Venus or Serena had retired, it would have come up well before the 44-minute mark.

No big deal. Not even a shot at ESPN. Just an observation.

Carry on.

I wish I could post the entire transcript, but HBO says that is not allowed. (I'm sure someone will do it Thursday somewhere on the Internet, but not me. I am well behaved.)

Anyway, Matt makes it bluntly clear the Patriots were well aware what they were doing was naughty, that they took elaborate steps to mask what they were doing and that it helped them on the field almost immediately.

Also, he is not amused with how he has been portrayed and treated.

Click below for as many highlights as I feel comfortable sharing at this time.

Like I said, Manny being . . . well, you know. (MLB shut down the YouTube version. Here is the video at MLB.com.)

And, just for the heck of it, check out Neil Best being Neil Best.

You could read it right here right now if you are interested.

One secret to popular blogging is a predictable schedule of posting. But that's not me. I blogged very little Tuesday, blogged a lot Wednesday and will blog very little Thursday.

Thanks for your patience. This inconsistency will continue as long as my editors insist on me writing a newspaper column thrice weekly.

It's a tribute from Cohen to his own past as a kid who sat there long ago - and to fellow Mets fans - as the old ballpark prepares to be shut down.

Fellow long-time Mets fan Howie Rose is expected to join Cohen at some point from the radio side, and there will be special guests dropping by.

If you're at the game, you should wave.

Obvious question: Has Keith Hernandez or Ron Darling ever sat in the upper deck at Shea before?

Thursday also marks the debut at the store of what sounds like a cool exhibit about vintage basketball cards.

Why do I not just insist these friendly p.r. people buy ads in Newsday if they want people to know this stuff? I don't know.

I guess I figured some of you might find it interesting if you happen to be in the neighbhorhood.

Click below for part of the news release on the card thing.

This one is by us.

I didn't have Cablevision as a kid. At the time I didn't know or care how the cable business worked, of course. All I knew was that when I turned on my TV the Rangers and Knicks were on it and the Islanders and Nets were not.

Which is how I became a Rangers fan despite living in East Northport.

But the basic point is that despite widespread reports late last year - including by me - that pieces of the YES Network were for sale, they now are not.

So if you were saving up to make a bid, feel free to blow it on $8.50 bottles of Budweiser at Yankee Stadium. That's for 16 ounces. It's $9.50 for 20.

I digress.

Then, out of leftfield, comes this from ESPN.com's biggest star, Bill Simmons, who evidently is not bashful about being critical of his bosses.

So here we have Deadspin interviewing the Sports Guy, a meeting of two of the biggest brands in Internet-based sports media.

It's a crazy, mixed up media world out there, and WatchDog is here for you, always ready to slobber over it.

What does ESPN have to say about all this?

"Bill is an exceptional talent with a unique voice that we're proud to bring to fans. In any creative environment that features talented people, there will inevitably be differences. As we have in the past, we'll continue to work through them."

Eventually I (figuratively) threw up my hands and told him what I tell everyone:

That as much as I enjoy my current job I never have denied it is silly.

Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Comcast) never, ever is going to stop torturing the NFL as punishment for keeping that Thursday-Saturday game package for itself rather than selling it to Comcast.

Or at least not until the NFL agrees to make "Sunday Ticket" available to Comcast and other cable companies.

Sigh.