英语美文背诵 酿酒也疯狂(中)

Otherwise we're going to be making other people's choices, not our own.

否则，我们就将按别人的、而不是自己的意愿行事了。

After three and a half years with Outward Bound, I was ready to go hack¹ to school. I finished Harvard and got a highly paid job at the Boston Consulting Group. a think tank and business-consulting firm. Still, after working there five years, I was haunted by doubt. Is this what I want to be doing when I'm 50?

野外训练工作干了三年半后，我准备重返学校。哈佛毕业后，在波士顿顾问咨询集团——一家智囊团兼商业咨询的公司，我找到了一份薪水丰厚的工作。然而，在那里工作了五年之后，我头脑中又萦绕起一丝疑虑：难道这就是我想一直做到50岁的工作吗？

I remembered that some time before, my dad had been cleaning out the attic² and came across some old beer recipes on scraps³ of yellow paper. "Today's beer is basically water that can hold a head," he'd told me.

记得不久前，父亲在整理阁楼时，偶然找到了一些写在发了黄的小纸片上的古老的啤酒配方。他告诉我：“现在的啤酒基本上都是水，只是面上有一些泡沫。”

I agreed. If you didn't like the mass-produced American stuff, the other choices were imports that were often stale. Americans pay good money for inferior beer, I thought. Why not make good beer for Americans right here in America?

他说的对。如果人们不喜欢喝那种大批量生产出的美国啤酒，那他们就只能喝进口的啤酒，但那常常是不新鲜、走味儿的。我想，美国人是在花大价钱买劣等酒。为什么不就在美国本地为美国人自己酿造好啤酒呢？

I decided⁴ to quit my job to become a brewer⁵. When I told Dad, I was hoping he'd put his arm around me and get misty⁶ about reviving tradition. Instead he said, "Jim, that is the dumbest thing I've ever heard!"

我决定辞职，做一名酿酒人。当我把这个想法告诉父亲时，我希望他会拥抱我，并为传统的复苏而心情激动。结果恰恰相反，他说：“吉姆，这是我所听到过的最愚蠢的话!”

As much as Dad objected, in the end he supported me: he became my new company's first investor⁷, coughing up $40,000 when I opened the Boston Beer Company in 1984. I plunked down $ 100,000 of my savings⁸ and raised another $ 100,000 from friends and relatives. Going from my fancy office to being a brewer was like mountain climbing: exhilarating, liberating⁹ and frightening. All my safety nets were gone.

虽然父亲尽全力反对我，但最终还是支持我了。1984年当我开办波士顿啤酒公司时，他成了我新公司的第一个投资者，勉强投入了4万美元。我拿出了10万美元的积蓄，又从朋友和亲戚那里募集了10万美元。从条件舒适的办公室出来，去做一名酿酒人，就像爬山一样：令人振奋，感到自由，但又觉法有些害怕。因为我所有的安全保护网都撤掉了。

1 hack   

n.劈，砍，出租马车；v.劈，砍，干咳

参考例句：

• He made a hack at the log.他朝圆木上砍了一下。
• Early settlers had to hack out a clearing in the forest where they could grow crops.早期移民不得不在森林里劈出空地种庄稼。

2 attic   

n.顶楼，屋顶室

参考例句：

• Leakiness in the roof caused a damp attic.屋漏使顶楼潮湿。
• What's to be done with all this stuff in the attic?顶楼上的材料怎么处理？

3 scraps   

油渣

参考例句：

• Don't litter up the floor with scraps of paper. 不要在地板上乱扔纸屑。
• A patchwork quilt is a good way of using up scraps of material. 做杂拼花布棉被是利用零碎布料的好办法。

4 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

5 brewer   

n. 啤酒制造者

参考例句：

• Brewer is a very interesting man. 布鲁尔是一个很有趣的人。
• I decided to quit my job to become a brewer. 我决定辞职，做一名酿酒人。

6 misty   

adj.雾蒙蒙的，有雾的

参考例句：

• He crossed over to the window to see if it was still misty.他走到窗户那儿，看看是不是还有雾霭。
• The misty scene had a dreamy quality about it.雾景给人以梦幻般的感觉。

7 investor   

n.投资者，投资人

参考例句：

• My nephew is a cautious investor.我侄子是个小心谨慎的投资者。
• The investor believes that his investment will pay off handsomely soon.这个投资者相信他的投资不久会有相当大的收益。

8 savings   

n.存款，储蓄

参考例句：

• I can't afford the vacation,for it would eat up my savings.我度不起假，那样会把我的积蓄用光的。
• By this time he had used up all his savings.到这时，他的存款已全部用完。

9 liberating   

解放，释放( liberate的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• Revolution means liberating the productive forces. 革命就是为了解放生产力。
• They had already taken on their shoulders the burden of reforming society and liberating mankind. 甚至在这些集会聚谈中，他们就已经夸大地把改革社会、解放人群的责任放在自己的肩头了。 来自汉英文学 - 家（1-26） - 家（1-26）