2005年NPR美国国家公共电台六月-Living Life Among the Dogs, and Loving it

On Wednesdays the business report focuses on your work place. And today we continue our Take Two series about people reinventing themselves through their work. This morning NPR's Ketzel Levine profiles a couple who changed their jobs to make a better world for dogs. They left behind steady paychecks, benefits, health insurance and their home in Alaska.

Robin¹ Baizel left with the minivan. She cried through most of Alaska. Her husband Greg Gibbs followed, white knuckled², driving a big truck and hauling the mobile home. Their destination was Sparks, Nevada, site of their new business: a five-thousand-square-foot warehouse³, lined with rubber mats and feisty mongrels.
Are you ready for dogs? And here they come!
Oh! They go through microphone.
It's OK. I'm all right, I'm all right. Have you ever heard the phrase "the cobbler's children have no shoes"?
So your dogs have no discipline?
They are not the best, always, mannered.

Life is good here at the Canine⁴ Club, a dog training and doggy day care facility located outside Reno. The paying clientele has gone for the day. These four dogs are the teachers' pets. Among them a pony-size beast with pointy ears on a head the size of a microwave.

Hello, this is the boy who started it all. Come here.
CD is a Pit Bull/Akita mix, in other words a very powerful and potentially fierce animal. Robin Baizel and Greg Gibbs did not romanticize his origins: this dog was bred to fight.
CD was seven months old when they rescued him, knowing he would need some serious training. So they set out to get some training of their own.
All because of this big old galoot.
Ten years later, CD is a lamb, and the Baizel-Gibbs family is pursuing a new career. The couple left their jobs at the University of Alaska's Consortium Library to buy the Canine Club, a business that came on the market just as they were considering their options. For Greg Gibbs, the club is a down payment on a dream.
I wanna be a successful small business owner. I want to be a great boss, you know, I wanna grasp the entrepreneur spirit with both hands. And, this opportunity came along, and we jumped at it, we didn't let the opportunity pass by.
They bought the business with money from Robin's retirement⁵ plus the sale of the Alaska home. Today they are camped in a relative's driveway: four dogs, three cats, and two humans, shoehorned into a ten-by-twenty-foot mobile home.
This is a slightly different environment.
Yeh. Just slightly. We had, it wasn't a large house, just about 1,100 square feet. And I loved my little house in Anchorage. But this is OK. It's very homey.
And, it's very crowded. Every inch of space cramed with evidence of nine cohabitating lives. When Greg Gibbs, 43, and Robin Baizel, 48, left their steady jobs at the University of Alaska, neither had ever been self-employed. Last year their combined incomes exceeded 70,000 dollars. This year, it's a crapshoot.
We are actually paying ourselves 11 dollars an hour. But the number of hours varies week to week depending on the cash flow. No health insurance, no annual leave, no sick leave.
No pension.
Yeh, what's that?
So what do you make the leave you've made?
It's a little, maybe harder right now than we thought. But he is giggling⁶.
Yeh, it's all an adventure to me. I'm always optimistic.
And the marriage is resilient. Never mind the ever-present financial stress. Consider the omnipresent partner. Robin Baizel was sure she was going to lose it during the two weeks they were down to one car. But as the Nevada twilight⁷ descends⁸, and the animals sped down, she softens⁹ and gives her husband his due.
For him, to undertake this, leave a job he was actually pretty satisfied with , he'd developed quite a good job, and give it up, because he wants me to be happy, is the most astonishing thing I think that has ever happened to me in my entire life. I can't imagine ever having done anything where we deserve that kind of loyalty¹⁰.
We'll make it. We'll get through this, no matter what... Oh, I understand... damn optimism up and out again.
Oh you have no idea how annoying that is sometimes.
Ketzel Levine, NPR News.
You can see some family pictures and dog training tips at npr.org.

1 robin   

n.知更鸟，红襟鸟

参考例句：

• The robin is the messenger of spring.知更鸟是报春的使者。
• We knew spring was coming as we had seen a robin.我们看见了一只知更鸟，知道春天要到了。

2 knuckled   

v.（指人）指关节( knuckle的过去式和过去分词 )；（指动物）膝关节，踝

参考例句：

• He knuckled me in the chest. 他用指关节敲击我的胸部。 来自辞典例句
• Mr. Cruncher knuckled his forehead, as Sydney Carton and the spy returned from the dark room. 克朗彻先生用指关节敲敲自己的前额，这时西德尼 - 卡尔顿和密探从黑屋出来了。 来自英汉文学 - 双城记

3 warehouse   

n.仓库；vt.存入仓库

参考例句：

• We freighted the goods to the warehouse by truck.我们用卡车把货物运到仓库。
• The manager wants to clear off the old stocks in the warehouse.经理想把仓库里积压的存货处理掉。

4 canine   

adj.犬的，犬科的

参考例句：

• The fox is a canine animal.狐狸是犬科动物。
• Herbivorous animals have very small canine teeth,or none.食草动物的犬牙很小或者没有。

5 retirement   

n.退休，退职

参考例句：

• She wanted to enjoy her retirement without being beset by financial worries.她想享受退休生活而不必为金钱担忧。
• I have to put everything away for my retirement.我必须把一切都积蓄起来以便退休后用。

6 giggling   

v.咯咯地笑( giggle的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• We just sat there giggling like naughty schoolchildren. 我们只是坐在那儿像调皮的小学生一样的咯咯地傻笑。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• I can't stand her giggling, she's so silly. 她吃吃地笑，叫我真受不了，那样子傻透了。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

7 twilight   

n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期

参考例句：

• Twilight merged into darkness.夕阳的光辉融于黑暗中。
• Twilight was sweet with the smell of lilac and freshly turned earth.薄暮充满紫丁香和新翻耕的泥土的香味。

8 descends   

v.下来( descend的第三人称单数 )；下去；下降；下斜

参考例句：

• This festival descends from a religious rite. 这个节日起源于宗教仪式。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The path descends steeply to the village. 小路陡直而下直到村子。 来自《简明英汉词典》

9 softens   

（使）变软( soften的第三人称单数 )； 缓解打击； 缓和； 安慰

参考例句：

• Iron softens with heat. 铁受热就软化。
• Moonlight softens our faults; all shabbiness dissolves into shadow. 月光淡化了我们的各种缺点，所有的卑微都化解为依稀朦胧的阴影。 来自名作英译部分

10 loyalty   

n.忠诚，忠心

参考例句：

• She told him the truth from a sense of loyalty.她告诉他真相是出于忠诚。
• His loyalty to his friends was never in doubt.他对朋友的一片忠心从来没受到怀疑。