Transcripts

[CHEERS] MARK ZDECHLIK: Just about anywhere you go in the Twin Cities, or around Minnesota for that matter, you'll find Twins T-shirts, caps, and bumper stickers, not to mention colossal Twins banners that drape large office buildings. You can even bathe with Twin soap if you do your shopping at the same grocery store I do. However, Twins fever hasn't permeated all aspects of Minnesota culture, at least not at the reference desk on the second floor of the St. Paul Public Library.

PETER KELLY: Social sciences reference is Pete. Oh, I'm sorry, we have discontinued--

MARK ZDECHLIK: Peter Kelly is a reference specialist at the library. Do you know who the Twins are playing in the World Series?

PETER KELLY: Atlanta. I'm not sure. I want to say Atlanta, but I wouldn't swear to it at all hands, so I'm going to, I guess, personally try and avoid the hubbub from it.

MARK ZDECHLIK: Perhaps more true to her precise profession, Kelly's colleague, Jane Lefkin, at least had the facts down on the Series, even though she admits she doesn't care about the end-all of America's number one sport.

JANE LEFKIN: The Twins are playing the Atlanta Braves and that there the other from last to first place. And the demonstrations here against their misuse of the Indian symbols.

MARK ZDECHLIK: Down the street from the library at the Minnesota Museum of Art, receptionist Bruce Baker responded this way when asked what he thought about the Minnesota Twins in the World Series.

BRUCE BAKER: I'd rather pluck out my nose hairs than go to a game.

MARK ZDECHLIK: What will you be doing in place of watching the World Series?

BRUCE BAKER: Wishing that the Clarence Thomas debate was still going on.

Sally Replay, a guard at the museum, had this to say about the World Series.

SALLY REPLAY: It's capitalism, I guess. It's a lot of money, right? They buy off the teams. I don't know that much about it. It just doesn't interest me.

MICHAEL BARONE: It's repertory for-- it's calculated to entice and to please. Do stay with them.

MARK ZDECHLIK: Closer to home, Minnesota Public Radio Classical Music host Michael Barone found well editing an edition of Pipedreams couldn't explain why he's not excited about the World Series. Barone says he lost interest in baseball in his early years of high school when he discovered music.

MICHAEL BARONE: There's no logic to it. I mean, there's nothing more ephemeral than music. And music is the thing that I deal with, and that's just the way the genetic cookie crumbled.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

MARK ZDECHLIK: Nonetheless, Barone won't go so far as to accuse Twins fans of being intellectually impoverished.

MICHAEL BARONE: It's wonderful, I suppose, from a business point of view, and it's enjoyable, I guess, if you can get excited about that sort of thing. But I've got other things to do. There's a World Series every year. We just had one a couple of years ago.

MARK ZDECHLIK: NPR's Michael Barone, one of at least several people in Minnesota who isn't rallying behind the Twins. This is Mark Zdechlik.

[MUSIC PLAYING]