Since moving to Abu Dhabi, nearly four years ago, I have returned to the U.S. on three occasions.

Each of those three times … I saw a baseball game within a few days of clearing customs at LAX.

In this case, the Angels and Red Sox, at Anaheim Stadium.

As usual, I found it a very comfortable and comforting experience. Like I was able to reach inside my head and press the part of the brain where “serene” feelings originate. It felt very much at home.

I was again impressed with the reality that Major League ballclubs have 81 home dates, and rarely have a crowd under 30,000.

Those are just amazing numbers, in the context of world sports. Few of the top 30 soccer clubs in the world (whoever they happen to be, in a given year) have stadiums that seat that many people. Cricket draws 30,000 basically never, aside from the Indian Premier League, which lasts about 45 days. A handful of the biggest soccer clubs draw big crowds regularly (Manchester United, Real Madrid, Barcelona come to mind), but they play at home maybe 30 times a year — counting Champions League and cup matches. They do not throw open the doors 81 times.

The MLB is a ticket machine like none other.

So, Angel Stadium. Pretty much the same look as a year ago. Tim Mead, an Angels vice president and an acquaintance for decades, set up four tickets, and my brother and sister in law, and their son — an Angels fan through and through — provided the friendly company.

We sat in the Club level, down the left-field line … and it was nice. Someone came and took our food/drink order from us, and a bag of peanuts, a regular hot dog, a salad, a chili dog, three beers (a Blue Moon, for me) and a Coke cost $68.75. (I am impressed/amazed that regular fans pay prices so high.)

We had more than a few Red Sox fans around us, and they were annoying, of course. Perhaps the most annoying sports fans in the nation are Boston fans. It struck me that their “let’s go Red Sox!” chants might be a problem, in Dodger Stadium, which is a far more territorial place than is Angel Stadium.

The Red Sox have been surprisingly good this season, mostly because of their unexpectedly good starting pitching, and they have a handful of everyday players who remain popular. Dustin Pedroia, Jacoby Ellsbury and, of course, David “Big Papi” Ortiz, whose two-run pinch homer broke a 2-2 tie. And Mike Napoli, who seems to kill the Angels, his former team.

The Angels …

This is a team with some problems. One of them is Albert Pujols, who is on Year 2 of that $252 million, 10-year contract the Angels gave him; another is Josh Hamilton, who has a a five-year $125 million deal; a third is C.J. Wilson, who is on the second year of a $77.5 million deal. Pujols is decent but not the hitter he was in St. Louis; Hamilton has been mostly awful; Wilson has been erratic. It is not unkind nor incorrect to describe them as expensive mistakes.

This team really depends on Mike Trout, Mark Trumbo, Howie Kendrick, Jered Weaver and Ernesto Frieri. Erick Aybar is OK. Only Weaver makes big money, among those six. (Again, don’t give big, long contracts to 30-year-old guys. Just don’t.) The rest of the starters include Alberto Callaspo and J.B. Shuck, who pretty much embody the notion of “journeyman”.

Trout is easily the most popular Angel. No one is close. Talent+effort+results … fans lap that up.

Fans seem still unsure about Pujols, who started badly last year, ended fairly well … and is almost OK so far this year, but at the moment can barely run because of foot problems. Hamilton is someone the fans have not warmed to, in part because OBP is about .270 and he has a sort of nonchalant body language that is hard to accept. In this game he made what appeared to be a careless error on a fairly routine fly ball that cost the Angels a run.

Mike Scioscia, the manager, is not particularly popular, but the club seems to have come around to the idea of “whom could we get who would be better?” and the answer is “pretty much no one, unless Joe Maddon suddenly is available.”

The one dramatic change in the ballpark is the location of the press box.

For the first four-plus decades of the stadium history, the Angels had a big, wonderful press box right behind home plate, on the second level and so close to the action that to take your eye off the ball was to risk getting beaned by a foul ball. (The late Don Bradley was nearly knocked out by a foul ball that hit him smack in the forehead while he was looking down at a Sunday newspaper.)

That wonderful press box … has been moved. Way down the right-field line and up to the third deck. It is approximately 200 feet from home plate. Not at all ideal for working scribes.

The Angels join the Chicago White Sox as the only big-league clubs who do not have a press box behind the plate. (They certainly will not be the last; in the NBA, reporters used to sit at courtside. They rarely do, anymore.)

The writers can’t be happy about it, but no one much cares, outside the journalism profession, and it probably correctly reflects the decline in print influence — as well as numbers — that led the Angels to turn the original press box into an 80-capacity ultra-special-seat revenue-generating area.

But it was weird, no question, to scan the stadium … and see the boys up there in the third deck, looking down at the right fielder — instead of the home-plate umpire.

So, overall, enjoyable. Sitting with a couple of casual fans who made interesting observations, and one serious fan when I wanted to get stat-wonky, an interesting game that was close most of the way (and finished 6-2), and a stadium easy to enter and exit. One huge advantage Anaheim has over Los Angeles.

Will that one game be enough to hold me for 2013?

The Dodgers are home next weekend. Hmmm.