Kevin 'Cullen: Anything but a Yankees Fan.

I got two pieces of unsolicited mail last week, and am still trying to figure out which one was more defamatory.

The first one came from the New York Yankees.

I had a gun stuck in my face in Belfast. I saw bombs light up the Belgrade sky. I was in Iraq.
But nothing, absolutely nothing, could prepare me for opening my mailbox and finding a white envelope embossed with Yankee blue.

My hands shook uncontrollably. I broke into a cold sweat. I had the dry heaves.
Inside, there was a glossy booklet, the 2008 ticket information and fan guide, titled "The Final Season."
This initially brought joy to my heart because I thought it meant that Steinbrenner's unctuous son, Hank, had talked the old man into unloading the most overpaid sports franchise in the world.

But, no. It refers to this being the last season the Bombers play at what will soon be known as old Yankee Stadium.

My attorneys have contacted Martha Coakley, demanding a grand jury investigation into how my name got on a Yankees mailing list.
My mailman now looks at me with thinly veiled contempt.
The neighbors obviously know because they won't let their kids play with mine. My dog ran away. Actually, I don't have a dog. But if I did, surely it would run away.

If this isn't slander, it's pretty dang close.

As Ray Donovan, the unfairly maligned secretary of labor, once asked, where do I go to get my reputation back?
The second piece of unsolicited mail came from AARP, formerly known as the American Association of Retired Persons. Looking at their literature, and the shiny, neat membership card they so thoughtfully included, nowhere is AARP spelled out.
It's as if "retired" is a dirty word. AARP apparently isn't even an acronym anymore. It doesn't stand for anything. It's just AARP.

Sort of like the noise my dog might make if you stepped on its tail, if I had a dog, and if it hadn't already run away because the Yankees are sending me stuff.
Look, I'm 48 years old. I work for a newspaper, which is sort of like being a coal miner in Wales on May 4, 1979, and somebody tells you Maggie Thatcher just got elected prime minister.

I have two kids who go through money like Lindsay Lohan goes through lawyers. I have about as much chance of retiring as I do being selected in the next NBA draft.
It is possible AARP sent me a membership card because my hair is approximately the same length and color as its current magazine cover girl, Jamie Lee Curtis.
But she married into the British aristocracy. I married into a family from New Jersey.

Which, come to think of it, might just explain how those bums in the Bronx got my address.
Wait till the missus gets home tonight. There will be heck to pay.

Let's face it. There's only one conclusion to draw if you get an AARP card in the mail.
You're getting old.

I'm so old I got thrown out of the studio audience of the Major Mudd Show on Channel 7 for whipping Boston Baked Beans candy off the Major's space helmet.
I'm so old I drank Zarex.
I'm so old I was actually taught by nuns. Who hit us if we acted up.
I'm so old we had a black-and-white TV.
I'm so old my mother used to send me down to Malden Square to get the Record American at night because it printed the number the bookies used.
I'm so old that my friends and I would take the T in town for a dime, get a transfer on the bus for the Orange Line at Everett Station, and get bleachers tickets at Fenway for a buck.

And the park was half-empty.
So, go ahead. Call me old, if you must.
Just don't call me a Yankees fan.