Twins at Toronto. Twins 13, Blue Jays 4
Before tonight's game against the Jays, the Twins hung out in the clubhouse doing their knitting and needlework and scrapbooking, chattering about this and that, that and this. Lew Ford came in slightly late, eyes ablaze with excitement.
"Hey, you guys," he proclaimed, "did you get that e-mail?"
"Yeah," said Jesse Crain. "I tried that stuff. It doesn't work."
"No, no, not that one." Ford said. "About last night? At 1:02 and three seconds last night it was 1:02:03 4/5/06!"
"Huh?" asked Rondell White.
"1-2-3-4-5-6!" Isn't that cool?"
"Not as good as Cupcake Day," mumbled Brad Radke, combing his snazzy new goatee.
"The e-mail said it will never happen again!" said Ford. "Think of that!"
"Wait," said Torii Hunter. "The one I got said it will happen every thousand years."
"Wow," said Ford. "Every thousand years!"
"Wait," said White. "That’s not right either. I mean the same thing will happen in 2106, right? April 5, 2106? So it's every hundred years. That e-mail's totally wrong."
"Tell me about it," groused Crain.
"Not necessarily," insisted Ford. "I mean, who knows if there will even be clocks in 2106. Who knows if there will even be time?"
"What's wrong with him," whispered White.
"Can you imagine?" Ford asked the room. "A world without time? There would be no clocks or calendars. No speed drills or deadlines or curfews. You could play Doom all day long!"
"Wait," said Brad Radke, dropping his comb. "A world without time?"
"That's right," said Ford. "1-2-3-4-5-6!"
As Radke stared at Ford wide-eyed, something popped inside his mind. A world without time, he thought as he took the field. A world without time, he whispered to himself as he gave up a double to Frank Catalanotto. So, how would you know when to meet your hairstylist? he muttered as he gave up a dinger to Troy Glaus. Maybe in a world without time you wouldn't have any hair? he whispered as he gave up another dinger to Lyle Overbay.
In the dugout, Rick Anderson and Ron Gardenhire exchanged glances.
"Lew must've popped his brain again," said Anderson.
"I've got to keep him away from Brad before his starts," grumbled Gardy.
"Hey, Gardy," said Radke as he skipped into the dugout, "What would the world be like if no one had any hair? What would we have on our heads? Or would we not have heads anymore? And if we didn't have heads, how we would wear hats? And if we didn't wear hats how would anyone know what team we were on?"
"Come here for a second Brad," said bench coach Steve Liddle, hiding the bottle of chloroform. "I've got to show you something…"
Well, fortunately for the Twins, repopping Brad Radke's brain isn't that hard, once you get through all the gel, and when you get everything in place again he does just fine. Meanwhile, someone seemed to have repopped the Twins offense as well. When Sweetcheeks singled in the Twins' first run of the game, everyone in the dugout looked so gosh darned happy, because no one expected that, they expected the getting on base, sure, but hitting those guys in? Radical.
"Hey," said Juan Castro, "this scoring runs is fun."
"Let's do it again!" yelled Luis Castillo.
"Hey, Lew, tell the Jays about your e-mail."
"Gladly!" said Lew. "Hey, guys?" he shouted out to the Blue Jays fielders. "Did you guys know what last night was?"
Well, as you can imagine, Lew blew all of the Jays fielders' minds, too, and a couple errors later the Twins were back in business. Shannon Stewart kept on pace to hit 162 home runs, Luis Castillo's hustle was matched only by Joe Mauer's, our 4, 5, and 6 guys all had RBIs, Torii had a grand slam, and T-Fat actually drew a walk. In other words, thanks to situational hitting and hustle, not to mention some very long balls, the Twins batters overcame an early 4-run deficit and ended up with thirteen whole runs on the night, doing things pretty much how they're supposed to do it, and then some.
Blows your mind, doesn't it?