Better Know A Citizen - AMR
Posted by Andrew on Saturday, June 30th, 2007 at 10:09 am
Name: AMR (My initials. I'm not hiding, I just don't want my boss to google my name once and see my wasted time when I should be studying for exams. So I guess I am hiding.)
Hometown: New Ulm, MN
Town I Currently Live In: Brooklyn Park, MN
Profession: Actuary
Bats: R
Throws: Like a (right-handed) Girl
Positions: So far out in the Outfield, I was pretty sure no one would ever hit it to me.
Greatest Career Achievement in Baseball/Sofball/T-ball: Hit an inside-the-park HR in T-ball. I didn't watch the field, but there were probably a bunch of errors on it. Probably the only time I made good contact on the ball in my life.
Hobbies: Collecting Mugshots, Watching Baseball, Listening to Minimal House.
What are you known for around the WGOM? Mugshot Purgatory, concern about underbills.
If you could have a nice, polite dinner with any 3 people - dead or alive - who and why?
- My grandfather-in-law Pete, who passed away a few months before I met my wife, just so I could meet him.
- Geoff from college, who I lost track of right after my daughter was born.
- My wife, because I would want her with.
If you could pick any 3 people - again, dead or alive - to go out and party, who and why? Grandpa Rich and Grandma Geri - when they were still in their 60s -, and my wife, but it has to be in some old bars of Germany or Austria. (I'd be the only one not to know the language.) Pub crawls seem so much more exciting when they're in centuries-old basements, and I'd love to see what Gpa Rich is like speaking his first language with a lot of beer in him. Might get thrown out of a few places. The last ten years have really taken a few steps off their speed though, so let's have it happen when they were still relatively young.
Sports Allegiances: the Twins, with the Royals in second. Mocking the Vikings. Everything else is constantly shifting depending on mood. For example, I was a big fan of Texas Softball for 2005-2006.
Favorite Books: Maybe "Palace Walk" by Naghuib Mahfouz. Or the Harry Potter books. I haven't read much that isn't for my exams or about parenting since 2002 or so.
Favorite kids books: "The Owl and the Pussycat" as illustraded by Jan Brett, and pretty much anything by Wanda Gag, whose stories are weird enough to be interesting but simple enough to appeal to the kids.
Favorite Baseball Movie: The Rookie
Favorite Non-baseball Movie: The Big Lebowski
Favorite Food & Drink: Venison Jerk Chops (wife's recipe), and Beer. I typically drink High Life and Grain Belt, but my beer taste is a lot like my non-twins sports fandom: whatever grabs me at that moment. I've been very fond of Summit's Hefeweizen. I'm frustrated by how everyone is starting to make Coriander beers.
Favorite TV Show(s): 24, Survivor, The Twins on FSN, other baseball.
Favorite Twins Player, historically: Carlos Silva 2003-2004, love the sinkerballer, and my history with the team really starts in 2001.
Favorite Twins Player, currently: Matt Guerrier.
Best Twins Memory: (Tie) Matthew LeCroy's GS in the Ninth in Toronto while I was listening on the radio; The Sept 2005 11:00 a.m. game vs the ChiSox that I brought my daughter to and where she got Matt G to sign her ticket after his bullpen session and she was given a Jacque Jones foul ball. The last game of 2006 was pretty cool, too.
Favorite Sport to Play: Maybe Swimming (I did that competitively as a youth). Is Candy Land a sport?
Favorite Sport to Watch: Baseball, followed by Softball and Curling.
If I could live anywhere in the world, I’d live in: Minnesota, but maybe put a couple of mountains in it.
If I was commissioner for a day, I’d:
- Rigorize the schedule a bit. Opening Game of the year is previous WS champ vs their LCS foe. The last series of the year should include last year's first place team vs last year's second place team. Keep the unbalanced schedule. Each interleague "Rivals" pairing only gets one series a year, and it alternates location, which allows most teams to play each team in the other league's division.
- Disassociate WS HFA from the ASG and go to either which team or league had a better interleague schedule, or just back to alternating.
- Full clemency for all players for pre-2004 PED use. Attend a Giants game and hope Bonds ties or breaks the record that day.
- Get rid of the BP caps and hand out silver sharpies so players can personalize their black underbills.
- Tell Fox to make their broadcasts better.
If I had Terry Ryan’s job for a day, I’d: Not sign any scrap-heap players. And then give the job back to TR.
SBG - great on-line magazine, or greatest on-line magazine? World's greatest.
Favorite Ballpark: The Metrodome. The only others I've been to are County Stadium (defunct) and Yankee Stadium (not gonna pick that on principle).
First MLB Game: I was probably 6 or 7 (1984-85). Twins vs Tigers (maybe?). My dad went with some guys from work and brought me with. We ate at Lion's Pub in Shakopee and I don't really remember the game, but I know we got home damned late. He got a beer in a souvenir cup with Frank Viola, Mike Smithson, and John Butcher pictured on the sides. Butcher was my least favorite because he was clean-shaven. I recently looked for this cup at home but couldn't find it.
Favorite blog: SBG and Uniwatch
Given the current global economic situation, would bananas or waffles be a better investment? Waffles freeze better, but Bananas have more potassium. I'd call it a toss-up.
How are the kids? Very well. C turns 4 in July and is excited to be starting preschool in the fall. A recent Target trip saw me buying her a pink Cubs cap. But: "C" for her name, pink for her favorite color, and also Jacque Jones is a Cub and was her favorite Twin while he was here. H is 18 months and is getting much better at speaking. It's hard to tell the first time he says a word, because he's just constantly improving his enunciation. He also can identify "Bae-bol" when it's on TV. Not that he's that interested. C can still get interested in baseball at times while at other times she tells me that she wants to watch commercials. Both kids started loving Bjork's music over the winter. It probably helped C that I told her the song "Isobel" is about a princess trapped in the forest.
DC or Marvel? Neither. Only comic book/graphic novel I've ever read is "Black Hole" by Charles Burns, which starts out pretty good, but fizzes out a bit. Still, I'm looking forward to the movie, should it ever come out. Read that while listening to the Knife's album "Silent Shout." Fits very well, apparently, the book was an inspiration for the album.
What's your favorite quote? Can't really think of one. "The Dude abides."
Favorite albums of the past ten years: Cinematic Orchestra "Every Day"; Plastikman "Consumed"; Bjork "Medulla"; Robyn "Robyn"; the Knife "Silent Shout"; Animal Collective "Sung Tongs"; Schneider TM "Zoomer"; Neotropic "La Prochaine Fois"
Favorite albums right now: Burial "Burial"; The Field "From Here We Go Sublime"
And now, let's update the map:
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Baseball + Music + Beer + Cute Kids story.
Took C with me to the liquor store last night, listening to the Twins game on the radio.
C hears Gordo say "Tigers" and she busts into Animal Collective's "We Tigers"
"Tigers tigers tigers tigers tigers tigers... Ooh-ah-o."
I ended up geting Schell's Zommerfest, a hometown brew.
Had a college buddy from Neu Ulm; he referred to Schells by the derogatory familiar name. I've only been there once; wish I remembered the name of the classy old polished oak bar we visited there.
Well, there's Deer Brand, which is a cheap crap American Lager (but it'll keep you regular), but they seem to do pretty well with their specialty beers. I think their Oktoberfest is better than Summit's. Snowstorm's formula changes each year and can be very good (whatever it was the first year) or completely horrible (year 2). I haven't gotten it each year.
Schell's makes some reputable brews. But how can you talk about New Ulm without at least a mention of Funkytown. I'm appalled.
What about Funkytown? I don't know...
AAAAAAAAAAAAuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuugh!
Won't you take me to FunkyTOWWWWWWWWWWWN?
Won't you take me to FUNKYtowwwwwwwwwwwwwn?
allegedly about New Ulm & polka. Lipps, Inc. Minnesota dance-music legends.
I think I knew it was about MN, but I don't believe I had ever heard it being about NU. The town's AM station (and still Twins Radio Network Affiliate) will still play a couple hours of polka a week.
It's not "polka" though to the locals that enjoy it, it's "old-time music." "Polka" would imply ony 2-beat songs, but there's some uptempo waltzes in most old-time bands' setlists.
Rhu_ru, A bierstube named "Schnitzelbank" allegedly had the oldest bar in America, or Minnesota, or something, brought over from Germany. That old bar is still there under new management, but the last time I stopped there (year ago?), it was as much of a nightclub as New Ulm could imagine.
As I had moved to college (Augsburg) before I turned 21, I don't have as a great knowledge of the pubs of New Ulm as I do the pubs of Cedar-Riverside.
Bought 24 of those babies for a dads/daughters camping trip Sun./Monday night at Carver Park. Delicious. Got quite a rig hooked up:
My bike with waterproof pannier, market pannier, seat bag and top tube bag, Burly Piccolo Trail-a-bike with handlebar bag, Burly Trailer with tent, sleeping bags, cooler, fishing rods, thermarest, clothes, tacklebox, frisbee, etc.
About 60 miles round trip door to door by bike. We hit the trail 9:00am sharp.
I think a big reason WGOM is what it is, is because there is a serious concern for gray underbills, and it's great that you're spearheading it. I'm sure I speak for all Citizens in thanking you. Oh yeah, the Mugshots are sweet, too.
And if you can get Fox to enroll Joe Morgan in Sabermetrics 101, you'd be a great man. Even greater if you got McCarver to shut up and go collect his retirement somewhere there's no microphone around.
I think the better thing for McCarver is to set him up in a booth with the Mic and let him go. Just never tell him that he's no longer broadcasting, but only sitting in a booth at the game talking to himself. Everyone would be happy.
I said it in the second or third non-Twins Mugshot Purgatory, but I don't actually mind the black underbills on the field. They look alright, although the photograph poorly for posed shots. Now, the BP caps are completely horrible.
The last version of the BP caps was cheap crap, too. The black underbills are fine, and shouldn't deter anyone from writing messages up there as long as baseball players are savvy enough to buy metallic markers, but I actually miss the old green underbills. Grey, meh.
Did you ever know Terry Steinbach? He's quite a bit older than you, of course, but he has to be a local legend.
MLB catcher (for the Tigers) Arlo Brunsberg was from my hometown. So I've got that going for me. Which is nice.
I don't think there is anyone remotely famous who came from my original hometown. However, Robert Vessey, former governor of South Dakota (many years ago) is from Wessington Springs. Also, Al Neuharth is from this county (Alpena), and still has some relatives here.
And I forgot, Tony Oliva married a girl who has relatives in this area. He was in Springs once, for an amateur baseball game of which I was the public address announcer.
If I remember right, Terry Steinbach and (longtime Twins farmhand) Brian Raabe both played ball with my uncle Chuck in little league/high school. Maybe only one year or something like that. I don't know Steinbach, but I met him and got a signed photo once.
For his entire ML career, there was a box in the NU Journal "Steinbach's Box" that had his updated stats every day, page 2 of the B section (usually one day in arrears, they liked to have the paper done at about 10pm, and those Oakland results were rarely final at the time).
Raabe is four or five years younger than Steinbach. I played against the Steinbach brothers (Terry and Tom) in Babe Ruth and HS. Loved playing at that beautiful park in the center of town.
Johnson Park is pretty great for a small-town ballpark. For a few summers before I got a job, I would go down there 15-20 times to watch Uncle Chuck and (my favorite) Todd Pfaff and others play town-ball. (Post college?) Most of the time, they were on the New Ulm Brewers, but I know Chuck was on New Ulm Kaiserhoff (sponsored by a bar) for at least one year.
I would tag along with Gma Nita and Gpa Gene (RIP), his parents, and my mom and my ucle Rod and probably went to about 10 road games a summer, too. Searles, Litchfield, Springfield, Sleepy Eye, St. James, etc. New Ulm's was a Major-League field compared to those towns, although it served as the field for the summer town-ball leagues as well as the Catholic and Public Schools' baseball teams. (The attached football field was home for three schools: Public, Catholic, and Lutheran.)
Yeah, New Ulm had* two town ball teams, in two leagues. The town is as baseball a town as South St. Paul is a hockey town. I went to the Catholic High School and both the Softball and Baseball teams made state while I was in HS. (Softball won at least twice behind tall pitcher Steph Klaviter). My sister's public-school softball team was state runner-up her senior year (she was catcher).
*unsure of current state of New Ulm baseball.
If you played against the Steinbachs, it's possible you played against my uncle Chuck. Pitcher/second baseman IIRC.
I keep mentioning Todd Pfaff's name so if he ever googles his name, he sees that he still has a fan out there. I still have the 420 foot homer (signed by Todd M. Pfaff #12) on display in my home. I've got the newspaper clipping, too. There's part of a Twins game description on the back. I may use those details to date the ball: Twins scored 17, over Detroit. Chili Davis had 3 RBI. Hrbek and Shane MAck and Jef Reboulet each had 2 RBI. Twins improved to 25-20.
May 29, 1992.
Stienbach presently lives in Hamel MN. Moss is friends with the fellow that built Stienbach's house. They live about three houses apart.
Stienbach's house reportedly has a sport court, as well as a pool area with a retractable roof!
Luxury boxes?
I shared a school bus stop for 6 years with a girl who eventually became Mrs. Christian Laettner.
We should have had a question about the most famous person from your own hometown. I, of course, will have to admit that Chuck Klosterman is the most famous person from SBGville, ever.
Spamtown: besides Burdette Haldorson, two-time Olympian in men's basketball?
Umm, probably John Madden, followed by golfer Tom Lehman. Pulitzer prize-winning poet Richard Eberhart and, according to his Wikipedia entry, The Things They Carried author Tim O'Brien, were both born in Austin as well.
I question O'Brien's case slightly
however, since he allegedly describes the town as one of "about 9,000". I rather doubt that the town was that small in the mid-1940s, when it had the largest meat-packing plant in the world and was pumping out bazillions of tons of SPAM for the boys overseas. Austin peaked in the upper 20s (maybe 28k?) in the 1960s.
of those figures, only Haldorson and Eberhart actually grew up in Austin. O'Brien apparently lived there until he was 10.
Other figures of some note: sometimes Twins blogger Brad Zellar (Warning Track Power at The Rake) and his brother, singer-songwriter Martin Zellar ("and the Hardways"). And, for a baseball-related note: Cubs' reliever Michael Wuertz.
New Ulm:
1. Children's author and turn-of-the-century hedonist, Wanda Gag. (Should be an accent on the A in Gag)
2. Former Twin, Terry Steinbach.
3. Brewer and Patriot* August Schell.
4. Some early governor of MN or something.
5. Current mildly popular rock-type musician, West Thordson of "A Whisper In the Noise". I only mention him because he was a friend who has a teeny bit (ever so teeny) of celebrity. The band's music is like grunge and Nine Inch Nails filtered through Low.
*I assume, maybe he actually rooted for the Krauts
Kind of a coincidence with your hometown and favorite moment. I was in New Ulm when LeCroy hit that grand slam (also listening on the radio, I was driving from St. Peter to Marshall). Highway 14 was under construction, so I was trying to navigate the detour and pay attention to the game at the same time. Shortly after he hit it, I realized I was lost in residential New Ulm.
AMR for commissioner! I agreed with everything you said you'd do. Bud's supposedly retiring. Let's start a grassroots movement.
And "Candyland" is definitely a sport. When you get in good shape, though, you'll be ready for "Sorry".
And you're a curling fan, too! The only time I can ever watch it is in the Olympics, but I really came to love it. I wish it was on TV regularly where I live.
Yeah, that's really the only time I've seen it, but I find it like a less-physical baseball. Every play starts the same way (pitch, slide big horking rock). Methodical and calming to watch (but then it gets tense, like baseball). Annette Norberg, the Swedish Women's team skipper is even an actuary!