Monthly Archives: August 2011

2011 Twins Game Logs, Minnesota Twins, MLB

2011 Game 109: Minnesota Twins at Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim (MUST WIN GAME!!!!!!11)

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the dunce

v.

that other santana

welcome back, span. we're glad you’re still here, and we’re glad to have you back.

the twins come back from a rare day off and face off against the LAAAAAAAAAA angels. on the mound is ervin santana, whom i'm told has been pitching alright as of late. since we’re obviously not having a fire sale, might as well start winning, i guess. now's as good a time the start as any...

Keeping Track

Minor Details: Games of 8/1

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Bufflao 9, Rochester 6 in Rochester.  The Bisons scored three in the seventh to break a 4-4 tie.  Mike Hollimon and Jeff Bailey each singled and homered.  Chase Lambin singled and doubled.  Andrew Baldwin allowed five runs (four earned) on eight hits and no walks in six innings to take the loss.  The Red Wings made two errors, leading to five unearned runs.

New Brtain.  No games scheduled.

Lakeland 11, Ft. Myers 2 in Ft. Myers.  The Flying Tigers scored six runs in the first two innings.  The Miracle had six hits, all singles.  Edgar Ibarra surrendered six runs (two earned) on five hits and two walks while striking out four in two innings.  Alex Wimmers struck out five in four innings, but also allowed five runs on five hits and a walk.  Ricky Bowen pitched two shutout innings, giving up one hit.

Cedar Rapids 5, Beloit 4 in Cedar Rapids (11 innings).  Randal Grichuk hit a two-out walk-off homer off Nelvin Fuentes.  Daniel Santana had two hits.  Lance Ray hit his eleventh home run.  Ryan O'Rourke gave up three runs (two earned) on four hits and two walks in six innings.  Jose Gonzalez worked 2.1 scoreless innings, giving up three hits and two walks.

Elizabethton 4, Johnson City 2 in Elizabethton.  The Twins scored four in the fifth and it was all they needed.  The Twins had only five hits but drew six walks.  Starter Derek Christensen worked four shutout innings, giving up two hits and two walks while striking out five.  Cole Johnson got the win despite allowing a run on three hits and two walks in two innings.  Madison Boer worked a perfect ninth for his eighth save.

GCL Rays 6, Twins 2 at Rays.  The Rays scored four in the first.  The Twins out-hit the Rays 8-5 but issued eight walks.  Phillip Chapman singled and tripled.  Starter Angel Mata lasted only two-thirds of an inning, yielding four runs on four walks and a hit.  Mark Trau and Marcus Limon each went two shutout innings, with Trau just giving up a walk and Limon allowing a walk and two hits.

DSL Padres 10, Twins 6.  The Twins were behind 8-1 after seven, then scored five in the eighth to make it look better.  Ronald Jimenez and Felix Gallardo each had two hits.  Starter Melcaides De La Cruz worked four innings, giving up a run on four hits and a walk to take the loss.

First Monday Book Day

First Monday Book Day: Pinch-Hitting Edition

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I remember the first times I read Neuromancer and Mona Lisa Overdrive. Or, at least, I seem to remember them. The memory places me in the middle of summer, up in my old bedroom which hangs out over my mom's driveway. The windows are open and the fan is struggling to move the hot, soupy air around the room. The prose, though, was cool, whisking me away to Chiba City, the Sprawl, and Freeside.

Reading The Windup Girl reminded me a good bit of my first read of those Gibson novels, but there's one significant difference: this feels like a winter book. While Gibson's writing has a hard, cold edge which evokes the hardboiled detective genre, Paolo Bacigalupi's prose is humid and his world opaque, a dense hazy world centered in Bangkok of the near-future. However, regardless of whether you've ever been to Thailand, you'll spend the first hundred or so pages trying to figure what on Earth the novel is to be about. The plot begins at the end of Chapter Eight. Prior to that it's an exercise in hacking your way through a jungle of prose, trying to orient yourself in the complex setting, and frankly, it's not the easiest book to get into. It's plenty good, don't get me wrong, but you do have to work at it a bit.

Once there, you're immersed in a post-oil, nearly post-carbon fuel world, a world at the mercy of multinational agribusiness, whose genetically modified crops are intellectual property to be pirated by genehackers, to be resisted by the Thai government, and whose engineered plagues are designed to kill native crops, creating new customers for engineered food in the wake of bioterrorism and famine. Motive power is provided by humans and GMO beasts of burden on the ground, by sails across the oceans (in trimaran clipper ships), or by dirigibles in the air. Special springs are used to store energy and can provide limited amounts of locomotion. One character speaks of his grandparents, who could not make the journey from suburbia to city center following the oil collapse, which is known in Bacigalupi's world as the Contraction. Several generations have passed since that initial shock, and the world has reformatted itself into a calorie-based economy, one that some Thais are desperately trying to keep at bay.  Mercifully, the world is presented matter-of-factly and not dogmatically.

From that kernel the book spins outward, simultaneously a book about an expatriate "calorie man" (with more than a touch of The Quiet American about it), palace intrigue and intra-governmental agency turf wars, and the windup girl Emiko, a beautiful creature genetically engineered in Japan for servitude and pleasure. Abandoned in Bangkok by her previous owner, Emiko seeks freedom beyond the seawalls of Bangkok, but as a windup she's contraband, one bad step away from being mulched by the Environment Ministry or slaughtered in the street by nearly anyone. The world is dystopian, but in a much hazier, hotter, and humid way than usually encountered. In this world, ice is a luxury, ironically one which a luxury item like the windup girl needs for survival. You'll find yourself seeking a cool place to read as you press on through the story.  If you're into science fiction, which a good number of Citizens appear to be, it will be worth your while to check this book out.  Pick it up from the library, though, lest it not grab you before you make it through those first hundred pages.

What are you reading?

Keeping Track

Minor Details: Games of 7/31

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Rochester 6, Scranton/Wilkes-Barre 3 in Rochester.  The Red Wings hit a pair of three-run homers.  Chase Lambin singled, tripled, and hit a three-run homer.  Mike Hollimon had two singles and a double.  Jeff Bailey singled and hit a three-run homer.  Denard Span was 1-for-5, closing out his rehab stint with an average of .205.  Liam Hendriks threw seven strong innings, giving up three runs on eight hits while walking none.  Jim Hoey struck out two in 1.1 scoreless innings to get the save.

Bowie 12, New Britain 8 in New Britain.  The Rock Cats led 6-5 after five, but the Baysox scored three in the sixth and three more in the eighth.  Yangervis Solarte had two doubles and a single, raising his average to .326.   Deibinson Romero singled and homered, his tenth, and drove in three.  Joe Benson singled and doubled.  Brian Dozier and Chris Parmelee each had two hits.  Deinys Suarez allowed five runs on eight hits and four walks in five innings.  Andrew Albers took the loss, surrendering three runs on four hits in two innings.

Lakeland 9, Ft. Myers 4 in Ft. Myers.  The Flying Tigers scored four in the second and were never threatened.  Josmil Pinto singled and tripled.  Starter Jhon Garcia lasted only 1.2 innings, surrendering five runs (two earned) on three hits and four walks.  Matt Hauser pitched two scoreless innings of relief, giving up one hit.

Cedar Rapids 6, Beloit 1 in Cedar Rapids.  The Kernels scored three in the first to take control.  Reggie Williams had three hits.  Adrian Salcedo allowed five runs on eight hits and no walks in five innings.

Johnson City 10, Elizabethton 6 in Elizabethton (10 innings).  The Twins led 4-0, fell behind 6-5, tied it in the sixth inning, but lost in the tenth.  Kennys Vargas had four hits, raising his average to .308.  JaDamion Williams had two singles and a double, raising his average to .373.  Max Kepler had two hits.  Jairo Rodriguez homered.  Tim Shibuya allowed six runs (five earned) on ten hits and two walks while striking out six in five innings.  Cesar Ciurcina pitched the tenth, surrendering all four runs in taking the loss.

GCL Twins.  No game scheduled.

DSL Twins.  No game scheduled.