雙語達人:世界末日9大預兆
小編摘要：當下，流行文化中最賺錢的話題是殭屍、吸血鬼和世界末日——這也合情合理。本文在向瑪雅預言致敬的同時，也爲你揭示2012世界末日來臨的9個另類徵兆。
$8.5 billion ain't what it used to be
Back in June, it looked like Bank of America had a rare win on its hands: a proposed settlement with trustee Bank of New York to the tune of $8.5 billion, meant to restore the damage done by faulty mortgage-backed securities financed by BofA's Countrywide division. Come October, the settlement fell apart because investors (among many other vocal groups, too) didn't feel the figure was high enough. $8.5 billion, not enough money? Yikes. That's a scary indicator for banking in general, but also for BofA considering it is more than the institution made in the last four years combined. The collapsed deal is another low-point in a rough year for the bank and CEO Brian Moynihan. At least he axed those $5 debit card fees.
85億美元都不夠花了
2011年6月，美國銀行（Bank of America）眼看就要取得一場罕見的勝利：它計劃以大約85億美元的資金，與受託人美國紐約銀行（Bank of New York）達成和解，旨在挽回由美國銀行子公司Countrywide提供資金的不良抵押證券所造成的損失。然而到10月份，因爲投資人（以及其他衆多意見團體）認爲85億美元不足以解決問題，導致和解最終破裂。難道85億美元還不夠多嗎？沒錯！總的看來，85億美元對銀行業來說是一個驚人的數字，而考慮到85億美元超過了美國銀行過去四年盈利的總和，這一數字着實令人吃驚。美國銀行和CEO布賴恩·莫伊尼漢2011年流年不利，而這次和解破裂則意味着又一低谷，但至少布賴恩還是做出了取消5美元借記卡費用的決定。
The hottest CEOs are very, very young
Facebook. Twitter. Groupon. Zynga. LinkedIn. Yelp. The list keeps growing, but the ages don't. Mark Zuckerberg (impending Facebook IPO: shooting for a $100 billion valuation), no longer a new name to anyone, is still only 27. Andrew Mason, CEO of Groupon (which raised $700 million for its IPO), is 27 as well. Zynga, which went public in December, is helmed by Mark Pincus, who even at 45 is on the young side for what was, until recently, the prototypical American blue-chip company CEO. (Think Warren Buffett of Berkshire Hathaway, 82, ex-Ford CEO Alan Mulally, 66, or ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson, 60.) Let's face it: the biggest, buzziest business news is continually coming from companies that are helmed by people who listened to Green Day in middle school.
商界當紅驕子都是小年輕
Facebook、Twitter、團購網站Groupon、社交遊戲公司Zynga、商務社交網絡LinkedIn和點評網站Yelp都是如今炙手可熱的科技公司，而且這份名單還在不斷擴容，但這些公司掌門人的年齡卻沒有呈現上升的趨勢：馬克·扎克伯克（Facebook即將進行首次公開募股：估值有望達到1,000億美元）不再是個籍籍無名的名字，而他2011年只有27歲；Groupon的CEO安德魯·梅森（首次公開募股籌資7億美元）2011 年也是27歲；Zynga公司於2011年12月上市，馬克·平卡斯是這家典型的美國藍籌公司的CEO。雖然他已經45歲，仍然是較爲年輕的CEO。（想想吧：美國保險公司伯克希爾·哈撒韋公司（Berkshire Hathaway）的沃倫·巴菲特已是82歲高齡、福特公司（Ford）前CEO艾倫·穆拉利已經66歲了，埃克森美孚公司（ExxonMobil）CEO雷克斯·蒂爾納森也60歲了。）面對現實吧，如今商界的重磅新聞都是來源於這些新生力量，而他們的掌門人都是些聽着綠日樂隊（Green Day）的歌曲長大的年輕人。
Hollywood knows it's coming
Movies and film have gone gaga for the end-of-the-world trope. If this thing doesn't happen in 2012 as the Mayans predicted, the entertainment industry is going to be practically disappointed. The hottest movie and TV franchises — think Twilight (oh, Edward!) — feed our obsessions with death. 2011, with releases like Melancholia, Super 8, and Rise of the Planet of the Apes, was yet another big year for the apocalypse and alien invasion movie trend that has been building for five years. This includes I Am Legend, 28 Days Later, Cloverfield, War of the Worlds, Children of Men, The Book of Eli, The Road, and of course, 2012. On television, we're watching shows like Falling Skies (alien attack), The Walking Dead (zombies), True Blood (vampires), and The Vampire Diaries (self-explanatory). All we want to see is the end of the world. Even business flicks know it: this year's two biggest, Too Big to Fail and Margin Call, were also, in a sense, movies about the end of the (financial) world.
好萊塢成了末日先知
世界末日的隱喻席捲了整個影視界。如果世界末日最終沒有象瑪雅人預測的那樣發生如期而至，演藝界將會失望透頂。最熱門的影視作品 ——如《暮光之城》（Twilight）——總是讓我們想到死亡。隨着《驚悚末日》（Melancholia）、《超級8》（Super 8）和《猩球崛起》（Rise of the Planet of the Apes）的上映，2011年是末日和外星人入侵題材的又一個豐收之年。此前的五年中，這種題材日趨火熱，電影作品包括《我是傳奇》（I am Legend）、《驚變28天》（28 Days Later）、《柯洛弗檔案》（Cloverfield）、《世界大戰》（War of the Worlds）、《末代浩劫》（Children of Men）、《艾利之書》（The Book of Eli）、《末日危險》（The Road），當然還包括《2012》（2012）。電視作品包括《隕落星辰》（Falling Skies）（外星人入侵）、《行屍走肉》（The walking dead）（殭屍）、《噬血真愛》（True Love）（吸血鬼）和《吸血鬼日記》（The Vampire Diaries）（一目瞭然）。不管我們想看什麼，看到的所有東西都是世界末日。就連商業電影也有所涉獵：2011年的兩部大片《大而不倒》（Too Big to Fail）和《利益風暴》（Margin Call）從某種角度來說也屬於（商業）世界末日電影。
Publishers know it too
The biggest novel of the year, by many accounts, was Colson Whitehead's Zone One, published in October. The subject? A plague has wiped out most of humanity and much of the remaining people are zombies. It was Esquire's "Best Book of the Fall." The New York Observer called it a "brilliant allegory of New York City living." In other words, we're basically Zombies already. Oh, and one of this year's other hugely popular releases in the literary fiction world? Tom Perrotta's The Leftovers, which focuses on the lives of the people left after The Rapture takes place.
出版界也聽到風聲了
從很多方面來看，2011年最熱門的小說當屬10月份出版的《第一區》（Zone One，科爾森·懷特海德著）。小說的主題是瘟疫奪去了大部分人的生命，倖存的人都變成了殭屍。它是《時尚先生》（Esquire）“秋季最暢銷書”。《紐約觀察家報》（The New York Observer）稱它是“對紐約都市生活最精彩的隱喻”。言外之意是，我們已然淪爲行屍走肉。另外，2011年文學小說最近流行的是哪一本？答案是湯姆 ·佩羅塔的《被遺棄的人》（The leftovers），描寫了“被提災難”（The Rapture，源自希臘文harpazo，被奪、被取及被提。因某種力量，以強迫方式將某人或某物奪走——譯者注）中生還者的生活。
Steve Jobs is gone
It's the saddest sign of them all. The satirical paper The Onion summed it up best with its headline: "Last American Who Knew What The Fuck He Was Doing Dies."
史蒂夫·喬布斯走了
這是最沉重的一條啓示錄。諷刺報紙《洋蔥報》（The Onion）的標題是最好的總結：《最後一個清楚地知道自己在做什麼的美國人去世了》（"Last American Who Knew What The Fuck He Was Doing Dies.）
Politics has totally stopped working
This one is 200 years in the making. The Republican presidential primary race has had more ups and downs than a rollercoaster (plus a larger-than-usual share of gaffes, shocks and horrors). And in the final wee hours of the year, Congress finds itself incapable of passing a tax cut extension that both parties essentially agree on. Things are only likely to get worse as the election approaches. It's like they aren't trying.
美國政壇停擺
這是一次200年不遇的事件。共和黨總統預選的經歷比乘坐過山車還要跌宕起伏（其間還包括不同尋常的失禮、震驚和恐怖）。在2011年最後的幾個小時中，美國國會（Congress）發現自己無力彌合兩黨分歧，通過減稅延長法案。隨着總統大選的到來，局勢只會越來越惡劣。而且政界似乎已經選擇了破罐子破摔。
Pizza is a vegetable
Okay, sure, it's really that Congress merely upheld a ruling about tomato paste, but that hasn't made a difference to the general public, which has decided that pizza is now a vegetable. The ruling credits tomato paste with having nutritional value-- one eighth of a cup has as much value as a half-cup of veggies--which certainly won't help us reverse the obesity epidemic plaguing our country's people. But hey, if the world might be ending, we may as well pig out.
披薩成了健康食品
好吧，其實，國會只是裁定蕃茄醬屬於健康蔬菜，但是這對公衆沒什麼兩樣，人們已經認定披薩就是蔬菜。國會的裁決認爲蕃茄醬具有營養價值——八分之一杯的蕃茄醬與半杯蔬菜的營養價值相同——當然，這對我們對抗困擾全美、威脅人們健康的肥胖症沒什麼幫助。但是，如果真的有世界末日，我們不妨做個飽死鬼。
We're still keeping up with Kim
You could say that Kim Kardashian and her K-crew are easy pickings for ridicule. This year, our fascination with the spoiled beauty reached a fever pitch. America watched as she married NBA player Kris Humphries, then continued to watch, in a mix of horror and delight, when they split up after some 70 days. You'd think that such a humiliating flameout would put to rest our interest for good, but it only continues, stronger than ever. Meanwhile, signs point to the possibility that Kardashian, or her family, or her managers, or someone at the helm of this circus, orchestrated the marriage as a publicity stunt (Humphries is now seeking an annulment on the grounds that Kardashian defrauded him). The worst part? None of that seems to matter to the audience.
卡戴珊讓我們欲罷不能
你可以諷刺金•卡戴珊和她的金家幫已經淪爲人們的笑柄。但2011年，我們對這個驕縱的社交名媛的着迷程度已經演變成狂熱。她與NBA球員克里斯•亨弗里斯的婚禮萬衆矚目；大約70天后，兩人閃電分手，人們除了震驚和興奮，依然選擇繼續關注。有人可能認爲這場婚姻以這樣難堪的方式收場將會永遠地澆滅人們對她的熱情，但是人們仍在繼續關注她，而且程度有增無減。同時，有跡象表明：卡戴珊本人、她的家人、她的經紀人、或者團隊的其他負責人在拿她的婚姻做秀，導演了這出鬧劇（眼下，亨弗里斯以卡戴珊欺詐爲由提出了離婚）。最糟糕的事是什麼呢？其實這一切都跟我們這些看客沒有關係。
Remember the Hansons? They make beer
MmmBop, bit du bop dah
Du bop, dooby dop wah
Du bop, bip budop bah do
Yeah, yeah
, those kids. The brothers on the album above, who put out "MMMBop," the chorus of which is also above. (That's the closest we can do to nailing the lyrics. It's very difficult. We listened five times.) While you were busy trying to get that song out of your head after some merciless coworker chose it from the karaoke machine at the holiday party, they were busy working on their next venture: beer. The trio has an IPA hitting the market in Q1 2012. It's called MMMHop. If that doesn't tickle your drinking fancy, how about Hello Kitty wine? The company has a California rose coming next year in Angel or Devil varieties. Meow.
流行樂隊都跑去釀酒了
還記得下面這段旋律嗎？
MmmBop, bit du bop dah
Du bop, dooby dop wah
Du bop, bip budop bah do
沒錯，就是他們。上圖中出版了《MMMBop》這張專輯的三兄弟（上文是主打歌的副歌部分）。（這是我們能聽寫出來的最接近原文的歌詞。歌詞的聽寫非常困難，我們聽了五遍都沒法確定具體內容。）就在狠心的同事從派對卡拉OK機中選中這首歌，而你試圖把它的旋律拋到腦後時，流行音樂組合漢森兄弟已經開始忙於進軍下一個事業：啤酒業。他們將在2012年第1季度推出印度愛兒啤酒（IPA），並命名爲“MMMHop”。如果它還不能激起你飲酒的慾望，那麼Hello Kitty紅酒呢？這家公司將在明年推出天使版和魔鬼版的加州粉紅葡萄酒。喵嗚！
