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题目：【读原著，学单词】雪崩（1）

一、中英文

The Deliverator belongs to an elite order, a hallowed subcategory. He’s got esprit up to here. Right now, he is preparing to carry out his third mission of the night. His uniform is black as activated charcoal, filtering the very light out of the air. A bullet will bounce off its arachnofiber weave like a wren hitting a patio door, but excess perspiration wafts through it like a breeze through a freshly napalmed forest. Where his body has bony extremities, the suit has sintered armorgel: feels like gritty jello, protects like a stack of telephone books.

送货员属于精英阶层，一个神圣的子类别。他已经到了这里。现在，他正准备执行他今晚的第三个任务。他的制服像活性炭一样黑，过滤掉空气中的光线。一颗子弹会像一只鹪鹩撞到天井门一样从它的蛛网状纤维编织物中弹开，但多余的汗水会像微风吹过新鲜的凝固汽油弹一样穿过它。在他的身体四肢骨瘦如柴的地方，这套装甲已经烧结了装甲凝胶：感觉就像坚韧不拔的果冻，像一叠电话簿一样保护。

When they gave him the job, they gave him a gun. The Deliverator never deals in cash, but someone might come after him anyway—might want his car, or his cargo. The gun is tiny, aero-styled, lightweight, the kind of a gun a fashion designer would carry; it fires teensy darts that fly at five times the velocity of an SR-71 spy plane, and when you get done using it, you have to plug it into the cigarette lighter, because it runs on electricity.

当他们给他工作时，他们给了他一把枪。送货员从不以现金交易，但无论如何有人可能会追上他——可能要他的车，或他的货物。这把枪小巧、航空风格、重量轻，是时装设计师会携带的那种枪；它发射的飞镖速度是 SR-71 间谍飞机的五倍，当你用完它时，你必须把它插到点烟器上，因为它是靠电运行的。

The Deliverator never pulled that gun in anger, or in fear. He pulled it once in Gila Highlands. Some punks in Gila Highlands, a fancy Burbclave, wanted themselves a delivery, and they didn’t want to pay for it. Thought they would impress the Deliverator with a baseball bat. The Deliverator took out his gun, centered its laser doo-hickey on that poised Louisville Slugger, fired it. The recoil was immense, as though the weapon had blown up in his hand. The middle third of the baseball bat turned into a column of burning sawdust accelerating in all directions like a bursting star. Punk ended up holding this bat handle with milky smoke pouring out the end. Stupid look on his face. Didn’t get nothing but trouble from the Deliverator.

送货员从来没有在愤怒或恐惧中拔出那把枪。他在吉拉高地拉过一次。吉拉高地的一些朋克，一个花哨的 Burbclave，想要送货，他们不想付钱。以为他们会用棒球棒给送货员留下深刻印象。送货员拿出他的枪，用激光打口哨对准那位沉着冷静的路易斯维尔重击手，开火了。后坐力很大，就好像手中的武器炸了一样。棒球棒的中间三分之一变成了燃烧的锯末柱，像一颗爆裂的星星一样向四面八方加速。朋克最终握着这个蝙蝠手柄，末端冒出乳白色的烟雾。他脸上露出愚蠢的表情。除了来自交付者的麻烦之外，什么也没得到。

Since then the Deliverator has kept the gun in the glove compartment and relied, instead, on a matched set of samurai swords, which have always been his weapon of choice anyhow. The punks in Gila Highlands weren’t afraid of the gun, so the Deliverator was forced to use it. But swords need no demonstrations.

从那以后，送货员一直将枪放在手套箱中，取而代之的是一套匹配的武士刀，无论如何这一直是他选择的武器。吉拉高地的小混混们并不害怕这把枪，所以送货员被迫使用它。但是剑不需要演示。

The Deliverator’s car has enough potential energy packed into its batteries to fire a pound of bacon into the Asteroid Belt. Unlike a bimbo box or a Burb beater, the Deliverator’s car unloads that power through gaping, gleaming, polished sphincters. When the Deliverator puts the hammer down, shit happens. You want to talk contact patches? Your car’s tires have tiny contact patches, talk to the asphalt in four places the size of your tongue. The Deliverator’s car has big sticky tires with contact patches the size of a fat lady’s thighs. The Deliverator is in touch with the road, starts like a bad day, stops on a peseta.

送货员的汽车有足够的势能装在电池中，可以将一磅培根发射到小行星带中。与 bimbo box 或 Burb beater 不同，Deliverator 的汽车通过张开的、闪闪发光的、抛光的括约肌来卸载动力。当送货员放下锤子时，事情就发生了。你想谈谈接触补丁吗？您的汽车轮胎有微小的接触斑，在四个舌头大小的地方与沥青交谈。 Deliverator 的车有很大的粘性轮胎，轮胎上有一个胖女人的大腿那么大的接触斑。送货员与道路保持联系，开始就像糟糕的一天，停在比塞塔上。

Why is the Deliverator so equipped? Because people rely on him. He is a roll model. This is America. People do whatever the fuck they feel like doing, you got a problem with that? Because they have a right to. And because they have guns and no one can fucking stop them. As a result, this country has one of the worst economies in the world. When it gets down to it-talking trade balances here—once we’ve brain-drained all our technology into other countries, once things have evened out, they’re making cars in Bolivia and microwave ovens in Tadzhikistan and selling them here—once our edge in natural resources has been made irrelevant by giant Hong Kong ships and dirigibles that can ship North Dakota all the way to New Zealand for a nickel—once the Invisible Hand has taken all those historical inequities and smeared them out into a broad global layer of what a Pakistani brickmaker would consider to be prosperity-y’know what? There’s only four things we do better than anyone else.

为什么Deliverator装备这么好？因为人们依赖他。他是一个滚动模型。这是美国。人们想做什么就做什么，你有什么问题吗？因为他们有权利这样做。因为他们有枪，没人能他妈的阻止他们。因此，这个国家拥有世界上最糟糕的经济体之一。当谈到这里的贸易平衡时——一旦我们将我们所有的技术都集中到其他国家，一旦情况趋于平衡，他们就会在玻利维亚制造汽车，在塔吉克斯坦制造微波炉并在这里销售——一次我们在自然资源方面的优势已经被巨大的香港船只和飞船变得无关紧要，这些飞船可以将北达科他州一路运到新西兰，一分钱一分货——一旦隐形之手已经采取了所有这些历史上的不平等，并将它们涂抹在一个广泛的全球层面上巴基斯坦制砖商会认为什么是繁荣——你知道吗？只有四件事我们比其他人做得更好。

music

音乐

movies

电影

microcode (software)

微码（软件）

high-speed pizza delivery

高速披萨配送

The Deliverator used to make software. Still does, sometimes. But if life were a mellow elementary school run by well-meaning education Ph.D.s, the Deliverator’s report card would say: “Hiro is so bright and creative but needs to work harder on his cooperation skills.”

Deliverator 过去从事制作软件。有时仍然如此。但如果生活是一所由善意的教育博士开办的温和的小学，Deliverator 的成绩单会说：“Hiro 非常聪明和有创造力，但需要更加努力地提高他的合作能力。”

So now he has this other job. No brightness or creativity involved-but no cooperation either. Just a single principle: The Deliverator stands tall, your pie in thirty minutes or you can have it free, shoot the driver, take his car, file a class-action suit. The Deliverator has been working this job for six months, a rich and lengthy tenure by his standards, and has never delivered a pizza in more than twenty-one minutes.

所以现在他有了另外一份工作。没有亮度或创造力，但也没有合作。只有一个原则：Deliverator 屹立不倒，三十分钟之内你的馅饼送到，或者你可以免费，射杀司机，占有他的车，提起集体诉讼。送货员已经从事这项工作六个月了，按照他的标准，他的任期是丰富而漫长的，而且送披萨的时间从未超过 21 分钟。

Oh, they used to argue over times, many corporate driver-years lost to it: homeowners, red-faced and sweaty with their own lies, stinking of Old Spice and job-related stress, standing in their glowing yellow doorways brandishing their Seikos and waving at the clock over the kitchen sink, I swear, can’t you guys tell time?

哦，他们过去常常争论不休，许多公司司机都输了：房主，因为他们自己的谎言满脸通红，满头大汗，散发着旧香料和与工作相关的压力，站在他们发光的黄色门口，挥舞着精工和对着厨房水槽的时钟挥手，我发誓，你们不会说时间吗？

Didn’t happen anymore. Pizza delivery is a major industry. A managed industry. People went to CosaNostra Pizza University four years just to learn it. Came in its doors unable to write an English sentence, from Abkhazia, Rwanda, Guanajuato, South Jersey, and came out knowing more about pizza than a Bedouin knows about sand. And they had studied this problem. Graphed the frequency of doorway delivery-time disputes. Wired the early Deliverators to record, then analyze the debating tactics, the voice-stress histograms, the distinctive grammatical structures employed by white middle-class Type A Burbclave occupants who against all logic had decided that this was the place to take their personal Custerian stand against all that was stale and deadening in their lives: they were going to lie, or delude themselves, about the time of their phone call and get themselves a free pizza; no, they deserved a free pizza along with their life, liberty, and pursuit of whatever, it was fucking inalienable. Sent psychologists out to these people’s houses, gave them a free TV set to submit to an anonymous interview, hooked them to polygraphs, studied their brain waves as they showed them choppy, inexplicable movies of porn queens and late-night car crashes and Sammy Davis, Jr., put them in sweet-smelling, mauve-walled rooms and asked them questions about Ethics so perplexing that even a Jesuit couldn’t respond without committing a venial sin.

没有再发生。披萨外卖是一个主要行业。一个受管理的行业。来自阿布哈兹、卢旺达、瓜纳华托、南杰尔，无法写出英文句子，人们去 CosaNostra Pizza 大学学习四年，对披萨的了解更甚于Bedouin对沙子的了解。他们已经研究过这个问题。绘制门口交货时间纠纷的频率。连线早期的交付者来记录，然后分析辩论策略、语音压力直方图、白人中产阶级 A 型 Burbclave 居住者所采用的独特语法结构，他们违反所有逻辑决定这是他们个人 Custerian 的地方反对他们生活中所有陈旧乏味的事物：他们会在打电话的时候撒谎或自欺欺人，然后给自己免费吃披萨；不，他们应该得到一份免费的披萨以及他们的生命、自由和对任何事物的追求，这是他妈的不可分割的。派心理学家到这些人的家里，给他们一台免费电视让他们接受匿名采访，让他们使用测谎仪，研究他们的脑电波，因为他们向他们展示了色情女王、深夜车祸和萨米戴维斯的断断续续、莫名其妙的电影, 把他们放在气味芬芳的紫红色墙壁的房间里，问他们关于道德的问题，如此令人困惑，以至于即使是耶稣会士也无法不犯下小罪。

The analysts at CosaNostra Pizza University concluded that it was just human nature and you couldn’t fix it, and so they went for a quick cheap technical fix: smart boxes. The pizza box is a plastic carapace now, corrugated for stiffness, a little LED readout glowing on the side, telling the Deliverator how many trade imbalance-producing minutes have ticked away since the fateful phone call. There are chips and stuff in there. The pizzas rest, a short stack of them, in slots behind the Deliverator’s head. Each pizza glides into a slot like a circuit board into a computer, clicks into place as the smart box interfaces with the onboard system of the Deliverator’s car. The address of the caller has already been inferred from his phone number and poured into the smart box’s built-in RAM. From there it is communicated to the car, which computes and projects the optimal route on a heads-up display, a glowing colored map traced out against the windshield so that the Deliverator does not even have to glance down.

CosaNostra 比萨大学的分析师得出结论，这只是人性，你无法修复它，因此他们寻求快速廉价的技术修复：智能盒子。披萨盒现在是一个塑料外壳，波纹状以增加硬度，侧面有一个发光的小 LED 读数，告诉快递员自从那通致命的电话以来已经过去了多少造成贸易失衡的分钟。里面有薯条什么的。比萨饼，一小叠，放在送货员脑袋后面的槽里。每个比萨都像电路板一样滑入计算机的插槽中，当智能盒子与送货员汽车的车载系统连接时，会咔嗒一声固定到位。来电者的地址已经从他的电话号码中推断出来，并倒入智能盒子的内置RAM中。从那里它被传送到汽车，汽车计算并在平视显示器上投影最佳路线，在挡风玻璃上描绘出一张发光的彩色地图，这样交付者甚至不必低头看一眼。

If the thirty-minute deadline expires, news of the disaster is flashed to CosaNostra Pizza Headquarters and relayed from there to Uncle Enzo himself_the Sicilian Colonel Sanders, the Andy Griffith of Bensonhurst, the straight razor-swinging figment of many a Deliverator’s nightmares, the Capo and prime figurehead of CosaNostra Pizza, Incorporated-who will be on the phone to the customer within five minutes, apologizing profusely. The next day, Uncle Enzo will land on the customer’s yard in a jet helicopter and apologize some more and give him a free trip to Italy— all he has to do is sign a bunch of releases that make him a public figure and spokesperson for CosaNostra Pizza and basically end his private life as he knows it. He will come away from the whole thing feeling that, somehow, he owes the Mafia a favor.

如果 30 分钟的最后期限到期，灾难的消息会被闪现到 CosaNostra Pizza 总部，并从那里转达给 Enzo 叔叔本人——西西里上校 Sanders，Bensonhurst 的 Andy Griffith，许多快递员的噩梦中挥舞着剃刀的直接虚构，Capo以及 CosaNostra Pizza, Incorporated 的主要傀儡——他将在五分钟内给客户打电话，并深表歉意。第二天，恩佐叔叔将乘坐喷气式直升机降落在客户的院子里，再道歉一些，并让他免费去意大利旅行——他所要做的就是签署一堆让他成为 CosaNostra 的公众人物和发言人的新闻稿比萨，并基本上结束了他所知道的私人生活。他会从整个事情中走出来，觉得不知何故，他欠黑手党一个人情。

The Deliverator does not know for sure what happens to the driver in such cases, but he has heard some rumors. Most pizza deliveries happen in the evening hours, which Uncle Enzo considers to be his private time. And how would you feel if you had to interrupt dinner with your family in order to call some obstreperous dork in a Burbclave and grovel for a late fucking pizza? Uncle Enzo has not put in fifty years serving his family and his country so that, at the age when most are playing golf and bobbling their granddaughters, he can get out of the bathtub dripping wet and lie down and kiss the feet of some sixteen-year-old skate punk whose pepperoni was thirty-one minutes in coming. Oh, God. It makes the Deliverator breathe a little shallower just to think of the idea.

送货员不确定在这种情况下司机会发生什么，但他听到了一些谣言。大多数比萨饼交付发生在晚上，恩佐叔叔认为这是他的私人时间。如果你不得不中断与家人共进晚餐，以便在 Burbclave 中召唤一些顽皮的笨蛋，并且为了一个他妈的迟到的披萨而卑躬屈膝，你会有什么感觉？恩佐叔叔已经五十年没有为他的家人和他的国家服务，以至于在大多数人都在打高尔夫球和摇晃孙女的年龄，他可以从浴缸里淋湿滴下来，躺下来亲吻一些十六岁的人的脚——一岁的滑板朋克，他的意大利辣香肠要等 31 分钟了。天啊。光是想到这个主意，它就让交付者的呼吸变得浅了一点。

But he wouldn’t drive for CosaNostra Pizza any other way. You know why? Because there’s something about having your life on the line. It’s like being a kamikaze pilot. Your mind is clear. Other people—store clerks, burger flippers, software engineers, the whole vocabulary of meaningless jobs that make up Life in America-other people just rely on plain old competition. Better flip your burgers or debug your subroutines faster and better than your high school classmate two blocks down the strip is flipping or debugging, because we’re in competition with those guys, and people notice these things.

但他不会以任何其他方式开车去 CosaNostra Pizza。你知道为什么？因为有一些事情让你的生活处于危险之中。这就像是一个神风飞行员。你的头脑很清楚。其他人——店员、汉堡店员、软件工程师、构成美国生活的无意义工作的全部词汇——其他人只是依靠普通的竞争。更好地翻转你的汉堡或调试你的子程序比你的高中同学更快更好地调试，因为我们在与那些家伙竞争，人们注意到这些事情。

What a fucking rat race that is. CosaNostra Pizza doesn’t have any competition. Competition goes against the Mafia ethic. You don’t work harder because you’re competing against some identical operation down the street. You work harder because everything is on the line. Your name, your honor, your family, your life. Those burger flippers might have a better life expectancy—but what kind of life is it anyway, you have to ask yourself. That’s why nobody, not even the Nipponese, can move pizzas faster than CosaNostra. The Deliverator is proud to wear the uniform, proud to drive the car, proud to march up the front walks of innumerable Burbclave homes, a grim vision in ninja black, a pizza on his shoulder, red LED digits blazing proud numbers into the night: 12:32 or 15:15 or the occasional 20:43.

那是什么他妈的老鼠赛跑。 CosaNostra Pizza 没有任何竞争对手。竞争违背了黑手党的道德。您不会更努力地工作，因为您正在与街上的某些相同操作竞争。你会更加努力，因为一切都在等着你。你的名字，你的荣誉，你的家庭，你的生活。那些汉堡鳍状肢可能有更好的预期寿命——但无论如何，这是什么样的生活，你必须问自己。这就是为什么没有人，即使是日本人，能比 CosaNostra 更快地移动比萨饼。送货员自豪地穿着制服，自豪地驾驶汽车，自豪地在无数 Burbclave 房屋的前面散步，忍者黑色的严峻愿景，肩膀上的披萨，红色LED 数字将引以为豪的数字闪耀到深夜：12:32 或 15:15 或偶尔的 20:43。

The Deliverator is assigned to CosaNostra Pizza #3569 in the Valley. Southern California doesn’t know whether to bustle or just strangle itself on the spot. Not enough roads for the number of people. Fairlanes, Inc. is laying new ones all the time. Have to bulldoze lots of neighborhoods to do it, but those seventies and eighties developments exist to be bulldozed, right? No sidewalks, no schools, no nothing. Don’t have their own police force—no immigration control—undesirables can walk right in without being frisked or even harassed. Now a Burbclave, that’s the place to live. A city-state with its own constitution, a border, laws, cops, everything.

送货员被分配到山谷中的 CosaNostra Pizza #3569。南加州不知道是该热闹还是当场勒死自己。没有足够的道路供人使用。 Fairlanes, Inc. 一直在铺设新产品。必须要推平许多社区才能做到这一点，但那些七八十年代的发展是要推平的，对吗？没有人行道，没有学校，什么都没有。没有自己的警察部队——没有移民控制——不受欢迎的人可以走进来而不会被搜身甚至骚扰。现在是 Burbclave，这就是住的地方。一个有自己的宪法、边界、法律、警察、一切的城邦。

The Deliverator was a corporal in the Farms of Merryvale State Security Force for a while once. Got himself fired for pulling a sword on an acknowledged perp. Slid it right through the fabric of the perp’s shirt, gliding the flat of the blade along the base of his neck, and pinned him to a warped and bubbled expanse of vinyl siding on the wall of the house that the perp was trying to break into. Thought it was a pretty righteous bust. But they fired him anyway because the perp turned out to be the son of the vice-chancellor of the Farms of Merryvale. Oh, the weasels had an excuse: said that a thirty-six-inch samurai sword was not on their Weapons Protocol. Said that he had violated the SPAC, the Suspected Perpetrator Apprehension Code. Said that the perp had suffered psychological trauma. He was afraid of butter knives now; he had to spread his jelly with the back of a teaspoon. They said that he had exposed them to liability.

送货员曾经是梅里维尔农场国家安全部队的一名下士。因向公认的罪犯拔剑而被解雇。将它直接穿过罪犯衬衫的织物，沿着他的脖子底部滑动刀片的平面，然后将他钉在罪犯试图闯入的房子墙壁上扭曲和起泡的乙烯基壁板上.认为这是一个相当正义的半身像。但他们还是解雇了他，因为这个罪犯原来是梅里维尔农场副校长的儿子。哦，黄鼠狼有个借口：说他们的武器协议上没有三十六英寸的武士刀。说他违反了 SPAC，嫌疑犯逮捕法。说罪犯遭受了心理创伤。他现在害怕黄油刀；他不得不用茶匙的背面涂抹果冻。他们说他让他们承担了责任。

The Deliverator had to borrow some money to pay for it. Had to borrow it from the Mafia, in fact. So he’s in their database now-retinal patterns, DNA, voice graph, fingerprints, footprints, palm prints, wrist prints, every fucking part of the body that had wrinkles on it-almost-those bastards rolled in ink and made a print and digitized it into their computer. But it’s their money—sure they’re careful about loaning it out. And when he applied for the Deliverator job they were happy to take him, because they knew him. When he got the loan, he had to deal personally with the assistant vice-capo of the Valley, who later recommended him for the

送货员不得不借一些钱来支付。事实上，不得不从黑手党那里借用它。所以他现在在他们的数据库里——视网膜图案、DNA、语音图、指纹、脚印、掌纹、腕纹，身体上每一个他妈的有皱纹的部位——几乎是那些混蛋用墨水卷起来打印出来的，然后数字化它进入他们的电脑。但这是他们的钱——当然他们在借出它时会很小心。当他申请送货员的工作时，他们很乐意接受他，因为他们认识他。拿到贷款后，他不得不亲自与谷的助理副调调打交道，后者后来向他推荐了

Deliverator job. So it was like being in a family. A really scary, twisted, abusive family.

送货员工作。所以就像在一个家庭中一样。一个非常可怕，扭曲，虐待的家庭。

CosaNostra Pizza #3569 is on Vista Road just down from Kings Park Mall. Vista Road used to belong to the State of California and now is called Fairlanes, Inc. Rte. CSV-5. Its main competition used to be a U.S. highway and is now called Cruiseways, Inc. Rte. Cal-12. Farther up the Valley, the two competing highways actually cross. Once there had been bitter disputes, the intersection closed by sporadic sniper fire. Finally, a big developer bought the entire intersection and turned it into a drive- through mall. Now the roads just feed into a parking system—not a lot, not a ramp, but a system—and lose their identity. Getting through the intersection involves tracing paths through the parking system, many braided filaments of direction like the Ho Chi Minh trail. CSV-5 has better throughput, but Cal-12 has better pavement. That is typical—Fairlanes roads emphasize getting you there, for Type A drivers, and Cruiseways emphasize the enjoyment of the ride, for Type B drivers.

CosaNostra Pizza #3569 位于 Vista Road，就在 Kings Park Mall 的下方。 Vista Road 曾经属于加利福尼亚州，现在称为 Fairlanes, Inc. Rte。 CSV-5。它的主要竞争对手曾经是美国高速公路，现在称为 Cruiseways, Inc. Rte。 Cal-12。在山谷更远的地方，两条相互竞争的高速公路实际上是交叉的。一旦发生激烈争执，十字路口就被零星的狙击火力关闭。最后，一个大开发商买下了整个十字路口并把它变成了一个免下车购物中心。现在道路只是进入一个停车系统——不是很多，不是坡道，而是一个系统——并失去了它们的特性。穿过十字路口需要追踪穿过停车系统的路径，许多编织的细丝就像胡志明小道一样。 CSV-5 具有更好的吞吐量，但 Cal-12 具有更好的路面。这很典型——对于 A 类司机来说，Fairlanes 道路强调让您到达目的地，而 Cruiseways 则对 B 类司机强调乘坐的乐趣。

The Deliverator is a Type A driver with rabies. He is zeroing in on his home base, CosaNostra Pizza #3569, cranking up the left lane of CSV-5 at a hundred and twenty kilometers. His car is an invisible black lozenge, just a dark place that reflects the tunnel of franchise signs—the loglo. A row of orange lights burbles and churns across the front, where the grille would be if this were an air-breathing car. The orange light looks like a gasoline fire. It comes in through people’s rear windows, bounces off their rearview mirrors, projects a fiery mask across their eyes, reaches into their subconscious, and unearths terrible fears of being pinned, fully conscious, under a detonating gas tank, makes them want to pull over and let the Deliverator overtake them in his black chariot of pepperoni fire.

Deliverator 是一名患有狂犬病的 A 型司机。他正瞄准他的大本营，CosaNostra Pizza #3569，在 CSV-5 的左侧车道上行驶 120 公里。他的车是一个看不见的黑色菱形，只是一个黑暗的地方，反映了特许经营标志的隧道——loglo。一排橙色的灯在前面闪烁和搅动，如果这是一辆会呼吸的汽车，格栅就会在那里。橙色灯看起来像汽油火。它从人们的后窗进来，从他们的后视镜上反弹，在他们的眼睛上投射出一个火热的面具，进入他们的潜意识，并挖掘出可怕的恐惧，害怕被钉住，完全有意识，在引爆的油箱下，让他们想靠边停车让送货员乘坐他的意大利辣香肠火黑色战车追上他们。

The loglo, overhead, marking out CSV-5 in twin contrails, is a body of electrical light made of innumerable cells, each cell designed in Manhattan by imageers who make more for designing a single logo than a Deliverator will make in his entire lifetime. Despite their efforts to stand out, they all smear together, especially at a hundred and twenty kilometers per hour. Still, it is easy to see CosaNostra Pizza #3569 because of the billboard, which is wide and tall even by current inflated standards. In fact, the squat franchise itself looks like nothing more than a low-slung base for the great aramid fiber pillars that thrust the billboard up into the trademark firmament. Marca Registrada, baby.

头顶上的 loglo 以双轨迹标记 CSV-5，是一个由无数个单元组成的电灯体，每个单元在曼哈顿由成像师设计，他们为设计单个徽标所做的贡献比交付者一生所制造的还要多。尽管他们努力脱颖而出，但他们都涂抹在一起，尤其是在时速一百二十公里的情况下。尽管如此，还是很容易看到 CosaNostra Pizza #3569，因为它的广告牌很宽很高，即使按照目前的膨胀标准也是如此。事实上，深蹲专营权本身看起来只不过是芳纶纤维支柱的低矮底座，这些支柱将广告牌推入商标穹顶。 Marca Registrada，宝贝。

The billboard is a classic, a chestnut, not a figment of some fleeting Mafia promotional campaign. It is a statement, a monument built to endure. Simple and dignified. It shows Uncle Enzo in one of his spiffy Italian suits. The pinstripes glint and flex like sinews. The pocket square is luminous. His hair is perfect, slicked back with something that never comes off, each strand cut off straight and square at the end by Uncle Enzo’s cousin, Art the Barber, who runs the second-largest chain of low- end haircutting establishments in the world. Uncle Enzo is standing there, not exactly smiling, an avuncular glint in his eye for sure, not posing like a model but standing there like your uncle would, and it says

广告牌是一个经典的栗子，而不是一些转瞬即逝的黑手党促销活动的虚构。这是一个声明，一座为经久不衰而建造的纪念碑。简单而庄重。它展示了恩佐叔叔穿着他的一套漂亮的意大利西装。细条纹像肌腱一样闪烁和弯曲。口袋方巾是发光的。他的头发是完美的，用永远不会脱落的东西向后梳，每一缕头发都被恩佐叔叔的表弟剪成方形，他经营着世界上第二大低端理发店连锁店。恩佐叔叔站在那里，并不完全是微笑，他的眼中肯定闪烁着细长的光芒，不像模特那样摆姿势，而是像你叔叔那样站在那里，上面写着

The Mafia

黑手党

you’ve got a friend in The Family!

你有一个朋友在家庭！

paid for by the Our Thing Foundation

由我们的事物基金会支付

The billboard serves as the Deliverator’s polestar. He knows that when he gets to the place on CSV-5 where the bottom corner of the billboard is obscured by the pseudo-Gothic stained-glass arches of the local Reverend Wayne’s Pearly Gates franchise, it’s time for him to get over into the right lanes where the retards and the bimbo boxes poke along, random, indecisive, looking at each passing franchise’s driveway like they don’t know if it’s a promise or a threat.

广告牌是Deliverator 的北极星。他知道，当他到达 CSV-5 广告牌的底角被当地牧师韦恩的珍珠门特许经营权的伪哥特式彩色玻璃拱门遮住的地方时，是时候让他进入右边了智障和垃圾箱在车道上乱窜，随机，优柔寡断，看着每一个经过特许经营的车道，就像他们不知道这是承诺还是威胁。

He cuts off a bimbo box-a family minivan-veers past the Buy ‘n’ Fly that is next door, and pulls into CosaNostra Pizza #3569. Those big fat contact patches complain, squeal a little bit, but they hold on to the patented Fairlanes, Inc. high-traction pavement and guide him into the chute. No other Deliverators are waiting in the chute. That is good, that means high turnover for him, fast action, keep moving that ‘za. As he scrunches to a stop, the electromechanical hatch on the flank of his car is already opening to reveal his empty pizza slots, the door clicking and folding back in on itself like the wing of a beetle. The slots are waiting. Waiting for hot pizza.

他从隔壁的 Buy ‘n’ Fly 旁边关掉了一辆小型货车——一辆家用小型货车，然后驶进了 CosaNostra Pizza #3569。那些大块肥厚的接触片会抱怨，发出一点尖叫，但它们抓住了获得专利的 Fairlanes, Inc. 高牵引力路面，引导他进入滑道。没有其他送货员在滑道中等待。那很好，这对他来说意味着高失误率，快速行动，继续移动那个’za。当他停下脚步时，他汽车侧面的机电舱门已经打开，露出空的披萨槽，门发出咔嗒声，然后像甲虫的翅膀一样折叠起来。插槽正在等待。等待热比萨。

And waiting. The Deliverator honks his horn. This is not a nominal outcome.

等待。送货员按喇叭。这不是名义上的结果。

Window slides open. That should never happen. You can look at the three-ring binder from CosaNostra Pizza University, cross-reference the citation for window, chute, dispatcher’s, and it will give you all the procedures for that window-and it should never be opened. Unless something has gone wrong.

窗户滑开。那不应该发生。您可以查看 CosaNostra Pizza 大学的三环活页夹，交叉引用窗口、滑槽、调度员的引用，它将为您提供该窗口的所有程序——而且它永远不应该被打开。除非出了什么问题。

The window slides open and-you sitting down?-smoke comes out of it. The Deliverator hears a discordant beetling over the metal hurricane of his sound system and realizes that it is a smoke alarm, coming from inside the franchise.

窗户滑开，——你坐下？——烟雾从窗户里冒出来。送货员在他的音响系统的金属飓风中听到了不和谐的甲虫声，并意识到这是一个烟雾警报器，来自特许经营店内部。

Mute button on the stereo. Oppressive silence—his eardrums uncringe -the window is buzzing with the cry of the smoke alarm. The car idles, waiting. The hatch has been open too long, atmospheric pollutants are congealing on the electrical contacts in the back of the pizza slots, he’ll have to clean them ahead of schedule, everything is going exactly the way it shouldn’t go in the three-ring binder that spells out all the rhythms of the pizza universe.

立体声音响上的静音按钮。压抑的寂静——他的耳膜放松了——窗户随着烟雾警报器的叫声而嗡嗡作响。车子闲着，等着。舱门开得太久了，大气污染物凝结在比萨槽后面的电触点上，他必须提前清理它们，一切都在按照不应该发生的方式进行。

Inside, a football-shaped Abkhazian man is running to and fro, holding a three-ring binder open, using his spare tire as a ledge to keep it from collapsing shut; he runs with the gait of a man carrying an egg on a spoon. He is shouting in the Abkhazian dialect; all the people who run CosaNostra pizza franchises in this part of the Valley are Abkhazian immigrants.

在里面，一个足球形状的阿布哈兹男子来回奔跑，打开一个三环活页夹，用他的备用轮胎作为壁架以防止它塌陷；他以一个用勺子拿着鸡蛋的人的步态奔跑。他用阿布哈兹方言大喊大叫；在山谷的这一部分经营 CosaNostra 比萨特许经营权的所有人员都是阿布哈兹移民。

It does not look like a serious fire. The Deliverator saw a real fire once, at the Farms of Merryvale, and you couldn’t see anything for the smoke. That’s all it was: smoke, burbling out of nowhere, occasional flashes of orange light down at the bottom, like heat lightning in tall clouds. This is not that kind of fire. It is the kind of fire that just barely puts out enough smoke to detonate the smoke alarms. And he is losing time for this shit.

它看起来不像是一场严重的火灾。送货员有一次在梅里维尔农场看到了一场真正的火灾，你看不到任何烟雾。就是这样：烟雾，不知从哪里冒出来，底部偶尔会闪烁橙色的光，就像高云中的热闪电。这不是那种火。这种火灾几乎没有熄灭足够的烟雾来引爆烟雾警报器。他正在浪费时间做这件事。

The Deliverator holds the horn button down. The Abkhazian manager comes to the window He is supposed to use the intercom to talk to drivers, he could say anything he wanted and it would be piped straight into the Deliverator’s car, but no, he has to talk face to face, like the Deliverator is some kind of fucking ox cart driver. He is red-faced, sweating, his eyes roll as he tries to think of the English words.

送货员按住喇叭按钮。阿布哈兹经理来到窗口 他应该使用对讲机与司机交谈，他可以说任何他想说的，然后直接传到送货员的车里，但不行，他必须像送货员一样面对面交谈是某种他妈的牛车司机。他满脸通红，满头大汗，一边想着英文单词，一边翻白眼。

“A fire, a little one,” he says.

“一把火，一点点，”他说。

The Deliverator says nothing. Because he knows that all of this is going onto videotape. The tape is being pipelined, as it happens, to CosaNostra Pizza University, where it will be analyzed in a pizza management science laboratory. It will be shown to Pizza University students, perhaps to the very students who will replace this man when he gets fired, as a textbook example of how to screw up your life.

快递员什么也没说。因为他知道这一切都会录到录像带上。碰巧，磁带正在输送到 CosaNostra 比萨大学，在那里它将在比萨管理科学实验室进行分析。它将展示给比萨大学的学生，也许是那些在他被解雇时将接替这个人的学生，作为教科书式的例子，教你如何搞砸你的生活。

“New employee—put his dinner in the microwave—had foil in it— boom!” the manager says.

“新员工——把他的晚餐放在微波炉里——里面有箔——砰！”经理说。

Abkhazia had been part of the Soviet fucking Union. A new immigrant from Abkhazia trying to operate a microwave was like a deep-sea tube worm doing brain surgery. Where did they get these guys? Weren’t there any Americans who could bake a fucking pizza?

阿布哈兹曾经是该死的苏联的一部分。一个来自阿布哈兹的新移民试图操作微波炉就像做脑部手术的深海管虫。他们从哪里弄到这些人的？难道没有美国人会烤他妈的披萨吗？

“Just give me one pie,” the Deliverator says.

“给我一个派，”送货员说。

Talking about pies snaps the guy into the current century. He gets a grip. He slams the window shut, strangling the relentless keening of the smoke alarm.

谈论馅饼让这个人进入了本世纪。他得到了控制。他砰地关上窗户，扼杀了烟雾警报器无情的鸣响。

A Nipponese robot arm shoves the pizza out and into the top slot. The hatch folds shut to protect it.

日本机器人手臂将披萨推出并推入顶部插槽。舱口折叠关闭以保护它。

As the Deliverator is pulling out of the chute, building up speed, checking the address that is flashed across his windshield, deciding whether to turn right or left, it happens. His stereo cuts out again-on command of the onboard system. The cockpit lights go red. Red. A repetitive buzzer begins to sound. The LED readout on his windshield, which echoes the one on the pizza box, flashes up: 20:00.

当送货员从滑道中拉出，加快速度，检查挡风玻璃上闪过的地址，决定是向右转还是向左转时，它发生了。他的立体声音响再次切断了车载系统的命令。驾驶舱灯变红。红色的。重复的蜂鸣器开始响起。挡风玻璃上的 LED 读数与披萨盒上的 LED 读数相呼应，闪烁：20:00。

They have just given the Deliverator a twenty-minute-old pizza. He checks the address; it is twelve miles away.

他们刚刚给了送货员一个二十分钟大的披萨。他检查地址，它在十二英里之外。

二、词汇

□ activate [ˈæktɪveɪt] v. 激活，使活化；使参战；（尤指透过加热）加速……的反应；vi. 激活；有活力；

原句：His uniform is black as activated charcoal, filtering the very light out of the air.

□ anonymous [əˈnɒnɪməs] adj. 匿名的，无名的；无个性特征的；

□ apprehension [ˌæprɪˈhenʃn] n. 理解；恐惧；逮捕；忧惧；

原句：Said that he had violated the SPAC, the Suspected Perpetrator Apprehension Code.

□ compartment [kəmˈpɑːtmənt] n. 隔层，分隔间；（飞机、轮船或火车上的）车厢，舱；区划；v. 分隔，划分；

原句：Since then the Deliverator has kept the gun in the glove compartment and relied, instead, on a matched set of samurai swords, which have always been his weapon of choice anyhow.

□ dispatch [dɪˈspætʃ] v. 派遣，发送；迅速处理，快速办妥；杀死，处决；n. 派遣，调遣，发送；（军事人员或政府官员间的）急件，快信；（由身在外地的记者发给报纸的）报道，电讯；

原句：You can look at the three-ring binder from CosaNostra Pizza University, cross-reference the citation for window, chute, dispatcher’s, and it will give you all the procedures for that window-and it should never be opened.

□ flank [flæŋk] n. 胁腹；（军队或球队的）翼侧，侧面；（大型物体的）一侧，一边；v. 侧面有；位于……的两侧；侧攻；adv. 在左右两边；

原句：As he scrunches to a stop, the electromechanical hatch on the flank of his car is already opening to reveal his empty pizza slots, the door clicking and folding back in on itself like the wing of a beetle.

□ gleam [ɡliːm] v. 发微光，闪烁；显得光洁明亮；

□ grim [ɡrɪm] adj. 严肃的；令人沮丧的；阴沉的；糟糕的；

□ intersection [ˌɪntəˈsekʃn] n. 交叉；十字路口；交集；交叉点；

原句：Once there had been bitter disputes, the intersection closed by sporadic sniper fire.

□ luminous [ˈluːmɪnəs] adj. 夜光的，发亮的；鲜亮的，鲜艳的；照亮的，明亮的；睿智的，美丽的；光亮的；

原句：The pocket square is luminous.

□ obscure [əbˈskjʊə(r)] adj. 昏暗的，朦胧的；晦涩的，不清楚的；隐蔽的；不著名的，无名的；vt. 使…模糊不清，掩盖；隐藏；使难理解；n. 某种模糊的或不清楚的东西；

□ stereo [ˈsteriəʊ] n. 立体声；立体声系统；（摄影）立体视镜（stereoscope 的别名）；（印刷）铅版（stereotype 的简称）；adj. 立体的；立体声的；立体感觉的；

原句：Mute button on the stereo.

□ turnover [ˈtɜːnəʊvə(r)] n. （一定时期内的）营业额，成交量；（商店的）货物周转率，销售比率；人事变动率，人员流动率；半圆馅饼（用水果、肉类或蔬菜做馅）；（比赛中的）易手，失误；adj. 翻过来的，可翻转的；

原句：That is good, that means high turnover for him, fast action, keep moving that ‘za.

□ fabric [ˈfæbrɪk] n. 织物；布；组织；构造；建筑物；

原句：Slid it right through the fabric of the perp’s shirt, gliding the flat of the blade along the base of his neck, and pinned him to a warped and bubbled expanse of vinyl siding on the wall of the house that the perp was trying to break into.

□ favor [ˈfeɪvə(r)] v. 较喜欢；偏袒；有利于；（非正式）长得像；悉心照料；n. 帮助；提拔；徽章；赞同；偏袒；同意性交；

原句：He will come away from the whole thing feeling that, somehow, he owes the Mafia a favor.

□ highland [ˈhaɪlənd] n. 高地；丘陵地带；adj. 高原的；高地的；

原句：He pulled it once in Gila Highlands.

□ palm [pɑːm] n. 手掌；棕榈树；掌状物；vt. 将…藏于掌中；

原句：A bullet will bounce off its arachnofiber weave like a wren hitting a patio door, but excess perspiration wafts through it like a breeze through a freshly napalmed forest.

□ rumor [ˈruːmə] n. 谣言；传闻；vt. 谣传；传说；

原句：The Deliverator does not know for sure what happens to the driver in such cases, but he has heard some rumors.

□ shove [ʃʌv] v. 猛推，乱挤；连推带挤地走； 随便放置，乱放（某物）；移动身体，挪动身体（以腾出地方）；去他的，让……见鬼；n. 猛推；

原句：A Nipponese robot arm shoves the pizza out and into the top slot.

□ thigh [θaɪ] n. 大腿，股；（禽类的）腿；

原句：The Deliverator’s car has big sticky tires with contact patches the size of a fat lady’s thighs.

□ trademark [ˈtreɪdmɑːk] n. 商标；特征，标志；vt. 用商标标明；认出某人的典型特征是……；

原句：In fact, the squat franchise itself looks like nothing more than a low-slung base for the great aramid fiber pillars that thrust the billboard up into the trademark firmament.

□ bustle [ˈbʌsl] v. 四下忙碌；使（人沿某方向）匆忙地走；繁忙；n. 喧闹；（旧时女子用的）裙撑；

原句：Southern California doesn’t know whether to bustle or just strangle itself on the spot.

□ filament [ˈfɪləmənt] n. 灯丝；细丝；细线；单纤维；

原句：Getting through the intersection involves tracing paths through the parking system, many braided filaments of direction like the Ho Chi Minh trail.

□ fleeting [ˈfliːtɪŋ] adj. 飞逝的；转瞬间的；v. 迅速移动（fleet的ing形式）；

原句：The billboard is a classic, a chestnut, not a figment of some fleeting Mafia promotional campaign.

□ flip [flɪp] v. （使）翻转；快速翻阅，翻动；vt. 打开（开关）；掷，丢……；倒卖（房产）；vi. 蹦跳；（情况、位置、状态等的）突然变化；adj. 无礼的；轻率的；n. 弹；筋斗；

原句：Other people—store clerks, burger flippers, software engineers, the whole vocabulary of meaningless jobs that make up Life in America-other people just rely on plain old competition.

□ harass [ˈhærəs; həˈræs] v. 骚扰；不断攻击（敌人）；

□ poise [pɔɪz] n. 镇静，沉着自信；仪态，优雅的姿势；平衡；（物理）泊；vt. 使平衡；保持……姿势；（人，组织）准备（做某事）；vi. 平衡，悬浮；准备好；

原句：The Deliverator took out his gun, centered its laser doo-hickey on that poised Louisville Slugger, fired it.

□ pollutant [pəˈluːtənt] n. 污染物；

□ profuse [prəˈfjuːs] adj. 丰富的；很多的；慷慨的；浪费的；

□ protocol [ˈprəʊtəkɒl] n. 礼仪，礼节；国际议定书，条约草案；（协议或条约的）附件；

原句：Oh, the weasels had an excuse: said that a thirty-six-inch samurai sword was not on their Weapons Protocol.

□ relentless [rɪˈlentləs] adj. 坚韧的，不屈不挠的；残酷无情的，不留情面的；不停的，不间断的；

原句：He slams the window shut, strangling the relentless keening of the smoke alarm.

□ righteous [ˈraɪtʃəs] adj. 正义的；正直的；公正的；

原句：Thought it was a pretty righteous bust.

□ sporadic [spəˈrædɪk] adj. 零星的；分散的；不定时发生的；

原句：Once there had been bitter disputes, the intersection closed by sporadic sniper fire.

□ squat [skwɒt] v. 蹲坐；蹲举；擅自占用；霸占；n. 蹲坐；被非法占用的建筑物；蹲举训练；（体操）下蹲动作；非法占用空房；几乎没有；任何东西；adj. 矮胖的；矮而宽的；

原句：In fact, the squat franchise itself looks like nothing more than a low-slung base for the great aramid fiber pillars that thrust the billboard up into the trademark firmament.

□ squeal [skwiːl] v. 告密；长声尖叫；n. 尖叫声；

原句：Those big fat contact patches complain, squeal a little bit, but they hold on to the patented Fairlanes, Inc.

□ traction [ˈtrækʃn] n. 牵引；[机][车辆] 牵引力；

原句：high-traction pavement and guide him into the chute.

□ trauma [ˈtrɔːmə] n. [外科] 创伤（由心理创伤造成精神上的异常）；外伤；

原句：Said that the perp had suffered psychological trauma.

□ undesirable [ˌʌndɪˈzaɪərəbl] adj. 不良的；不受欢迎的；不合需要的；n. 不良分子；不受欢迎的人；

原句：Don’t have their own police force—no immigration control—undesirables can walk right in without being frisked or even harassed.

□ accelerating [æk’seləreitiŋ] adj. 促进的，[物] 加速的；催化的；

原句：The middle third of the baseball bat turned into a column of burning sawdust accelerating in all directions like a bursting star.

□ blazing [ˈbleɪzɪŋ] adj. 燃烧的；耀眼的，炽热的；（力量、速度等）强烈的；（争论）激烈的；极其愤怒的，情感强烈的；

原句：The Deliverator is proud to wear the uniform, proud to drive the car, proud to march up the front walks of innumerable Burbclave homes, a grim vision in ninja black, a pizza on his shoulder, red

LED digits blazing proud numbers into the night: 12:32 or 15:15 or the occasional 20:43.

□ buzzer [ˈbʌzə(r)] n. 蜂鸣器；嗡嗡作声的东西；信号手；

原句：A repetitive buzzer begins to sound.

□ choppy [ˈtʃɒpi] adj. 波涛汹涌的；波浪起伏的；不断改变方向的；

□ competing [kəmˈpiːtɪŋ] v. （企业）竞争；（人）争夺；能匹敌；参赛（compete 的现在分词）；adj. 相互矛盾的；相互竞争的；

原句：You don’t work harder because you’re competing against some identical operation down the street.

□ expanse [ɪkˈspæns] n. 宽阔；广阔的区域；苍天；膨胀扩张；

□ fateful [ˈfeɪtfl] adj. 重大的；决定性的；宿命的；

□ freshly [ˈfreʃli] adv. 新近；精神饱满地；

原句：A bullet will bounce off its arachnofiber weave like a wren hitting a patio door, but excess perspiration wafts through it like a breeze through a freshly napalmed forest.

□ imbalance [ɪmˈbæləns] n. 不平衡；不安定；

原句：The pizza box is a plastic carapace now, corrugated for stiffness, a little LED readout glowing on the side, telling the Deliverator how many trade imbalance-producing minutes have ticked away since the fateful phone call.

□ inflate [ɪnˈfleɪt] vt. 使充气；使通货膨胀；vi. 膨胀；充气；

原句：Still, it is easy to see CosaNostra Pizza #3569 because of the billboard, which is wide and tall even by current inflated standards.

□ lengthy [ˈleŋθi] adj. 漫长的，长时间的；（讲话、文章等）冗长的，过于详尽的；

原句：The Deliverator has been working this job for six months, a rich and lengthy tenure by his standards, and has never delivered a pizza in more than twenty-one minutes.

□ perplexing [pəˈpleksɪŋ] adj. 复杂的，令人费解的；令人困惑的；

□ perspiration [ˌpɜːspəˈreɪʃn] n. 汗水；流汗；努力；

原句：A bullet will bounce off its arachnofiber weave like a wren hitting a patio door, but excess perspiration wafts through it like a breeze through a freshly napalmed forest.

□ polished [ˈpɒlɪʃt] adj. 擦亮的；优美的；圆滑的；v. 擦亮（polish的过去式和过去分词）；

原句：Unlike a bimbo box or a Burb beater, the Deliverator’s car unloads that power through gaping, gleaming, polished sphincters.

□ strand [strænd] n. （绳、线、毛发等的）股，缕；串；（故事、观点、计划等的）部分；（海洋、湖或河的）岸，滨；v. 使滞留，使困在（某处）；使（船，船员，海洋生物）搁浅；使（跑垒员）残留垒上；

□ unearth [ʌnˈɜːθ] vt. 发掘；揭露，发现；从洞中赶出；

□ creativity [ˌkriːeɪˈtɪvəti] n. 创造力，独创性；

原句：No brightness or creativity involved-but no cooperation either.

□ franchise [ˈfræntʃaɪz] n. 特许经营权；获特许经营权的企业（商店）；公民权，选举权；职业运动队；（由运动联合会授予的）会员运动队拥有权；特许经营品牌（或创意）；v. 给予特许经销权；给予……公民权（或选举权）；

原句：His car is an invisible black lozenge, just a dark place that reflects the tunnel of franchise signs—the loglo.

□ designer [dɪˈzaɪnə(r)] n. 设计师，设计者；谋划者；adj. 由著名设计师设计的，标有设计师姓名的；时尚的，时髦的；

□ inexplicable [ˌɪnɪkˈsplɪkəbl] adj. 费解的；无法说明的；不能解释的；

□ subconscious [ˌsʌbˈkɒnʃəs] adj. 潜意识的，下意识的；n. 下意识（心理活动），潜意识（心理活动）；

□ discordant [dɪsˈkɔːdənt] adj. 不和谐的，刺耳的；不一致的；

原句：The Deliverator hears a discordant beetling over the metal hurricane of his sound system and realizes that it is a smoke alarm, coming from inside the franchise.

□ congeal [kənˈdʒiːl] vi. 凝结；凝固；vt. 使……凝结；使……冻结；

□ intercom [ˈɪntəkɒm] n. 对讲机；内部通话装置；

□ cruiseway [‘kruːzweɪ] n. 供乘船游览用的河道；

原句：highway and is now called Cruiseways, Inc.

□ windshield [ˈwɪndʃiːld] n. 挡风玻璃；

□ perpetrator [ˈpɜːpətreɪtə(r)] n. 犯罪者；作恶者；行凶者；

原句：Said that he had violated the SPAC, the Suspected Perpetrator Apprehension Code.

□ detonate [ˈdetəneɪt] vt. 使爆炸；vi. 引爆，爆炸；

原句：It is the kind of fire that just barely puts out enough smoke to detonate the smoke alarms.

□ bastard [ˈbɑːstəd; ˈbæstəd] n. 私生子；卑鄙小人，讨厌鬼；家伙；极棘手的事，极讨厌的事；adj. 私生的；（事物）杂种的，低劣的；（字迹、字体）不合标准的，混杂的；

□ subroutine [ˈsʌbruːtiːn] n. [计] 子程序；

□ retinal [ˈretɪnl] adj. 视网膜的；n. [生化]视黄醛（等于 retinene）；

□ driveway [ˈdraɪvweɪ] n. （从建筑物，住房，车库等通往大路的）私人车道；

□ billboard [ˈbɪlbɔːd] n. 广告牌；布告板；vt. 宣传；介绍；

原句：Still, it is easy to see CosaNostra Pizza #3569 because of the billboard, which is wide and tall even by current inflated standards.

□ asteroid [ˈæstərɔɪd] n. [天] 小行星；[无脊椎] 海盘车；小游星；adj. 星状的；

原句：The Deliverator’s car has enough potential energy packed into its batteries to fire a pound of bacon into the Asteroid Belt.

□ promotional [prəˈməʊʃənl] adj. 促销的；增进的；奖励的；

原句：The billboard is a classic, a chestnut, not a figment of some fleeting Mafia promotional campaign.

□ reverend [ˈrevərənd] adj. （尊称神职人员）尊敬的，可敬的；教士的；n. （非正式）教士，牧师；

□ strangle [ˈstræŋɡl] v. 扼死，勒死，绞死；抑制，扼杀；抑制，压制（冲动，行动，声音）；

原句：Southern California doesn’t know whether to bustle or just strangle itself on the spot.

□ indecisive [ˌɪndɪˈsaɪsɪv] adj. 犹豫不决的；非决定性的；

□ sawdust [ˈsɔːdʌst] n. [木]锯屑；adj. 撒木屑的；无实质的；vt. 在……上撒木屑；用木屑填塞；

原句：The middle third of the baseball bat turned into a column of burning sawdust accelerating in all directions like a bursting star.

□ brightness [ˈbraɪtnəs] n. [光][天] 亮度；聪明，活泼；鲜艳；愉快；

原句：No brightness or creativity involved-but no cooperation either.

□ figment [ˈfɪɡmənt] n. 虚构的事；臆造的事物；

□ pinstripe [ˈpɪnstraɪp] n. 细条纹；细条纹布衣服；

原句：The pinstripes glint and flex like sinews.

□ minivan [ˈmɪnivæn] n. 小型货车；

原句：He cuts off a bimbo box-a family minivan-veers past the Buy ‘n’ Fly that is next door, and pulls into CosaNostra Pizza #3569.

□ oppressive [əˈpresɪv] adj. （社会、法律、习俗等）压迫的，暴虐的，不公的 ；（天气、空气等）闷热的，难以忍受的；使人苦恼的，令人焦虑的；

原句：Oppressive silence—his eardrums uncringe -the window is buzzing with the cry of the smoke alarm.

□ digitize [ˈdɪdʒɪtaɪz] vt. [计] 数字化；

□ citation [saɪˈteɪʃn] n. 引文，引语；传唤，传票；表彰，嘉奖状；引用，引证；

原句：You can look at the three-ring binder from CosaNostra Pizza University, cross-reference the citation for window, chute, dispatcher’s, and it will give you all the procedures for that window-and it should never be opened.

□ rearview [ˈrɪəvjuː] n. 后视镜，背视图；后视的；

□ bulldoze [ˈbʊldəʊz] vt. 强迫；恫吓；用推土机清除；

原句：Have to bulldoze lots of neighborhoods to do it, but those seventies and eighties developments exist to be bulldozed, right? No sidewalks, no schools, no nothing.

□ videotape [ˈvɪdiəʊteɪp] n. 录像带；vt. 将……录到录像带上；

原句：Because he knows that all of this is going onto videotape.

□ homeowner [ˈhəʊməʊnə(r)] n. 私房屋主；自己拥有住房者；

□ meaningless [ˈmiːnɪŋləs] adj. 无意义的；无目的的；

原句：Other people—store clerks, burger flippers, software engineers, the whole vocabulary of meaningless jobs that make up Life in America-other people just rely on plain old competition.

□ obstreperous [əbˈstrepərəs] adj. 吵闹的，喧嚣的；难驾驭的；

□ bulldoze [ˈbʊldəʊz] vt. 强迫；恫吓；用推土机清除；

原句：Have to bulldoze lots of neighborhoods to do it, but those seventies and eighties developments exist to be bulldozed, right? No sidewalks, no schools, no nothing.

□ lozenge [ˈlɒzɪndʒ] n. [数] 菱形；锭剂；菱形窗玻璃；

原句：His car is an invisible black lozenge, just a dark place that reflects the tunnel of franchise signs—the loglo.

□ zealand [ˈziːlənd] n. 西兰岛（丹麦最大的岛）；

□ pakistani [ˌpækɪˈstɑːni; ˌpɑːkɪˈstɑːni; ˌpækɪˈstæni; ˌpɑːkɪˈstæni] adj. 巴基斯坦的；n. 巴基斯坦人；

□ asphalt [ˈæsfælt] n. 沥青；柏油；vt. 以沥青铺；

原句：You want to talk contact patches? Your car’s tires have tiny contact patches, talk to the asphalt in four places the size of your tongue.

□ analyst [ˈænəlɪst] n. 分析者，化验员；心理分析师；

原句：The analysts at CosaNostra Pizza University concluded that it was just human nature and you couldn’t fix it, and so they went for a quick cheap technical fix: smart boxes.

□ abusive [əˈbjuːsɪv] adj. 辱骂的，侮辱的；凌辱的，虐待的；受虐待的；舞弊的，不法的；滥用的；

原句：A really scary, twisted, abusive family.

□ throughput [ˈθruːpʊt] n. （某一时期内的）生产量，接待人数，吞吐量；

原句：CSV-5 has better throughput, but Cal-12 has better pavement.

□ corporal [ˈkɔːpərəl] n. 下士；（舰艇的）纠察长助理；圣餐布；adj. 肉体的，身体的；

原句：The Deliverator was a corporal in the Farms of Merryvale State Security Force for a while once.

□ cockpit [ˈkɒkpɪt] n. （飞机的）驾驶舱，（赛车的）驾驶座；战场，格斗场所；

原句：The cockpit lights go red.

□ eardrum [ˈɪədrʌm] n. 鼓膜，耳膜；中耳；

原句：Oppressive silence—his eardrums uncringe -the window is buzzing with the cry of the smoke alarm.

□ firmament [ˈfɜːməmənt] n. 天空；苍天；

原句：In fact, the squat franchise itself looks like nothing more than a low-slung base for the great aramid fiber pillars that thrust the billboard up into the trademark firmament.

□ brandish [ˈbrændɪʃ] vt. 挥舞；炫耀；n. 挥舞；

□ stiffness [ˈstɪfnəs] n. 僵硬；坚硬；不自然；顽固；

□ polygraph [ˈpɒliɡrɑːf; ˈpɒliɡræf] n. 测谎器；复写器；多种波动描记器；

□ sphincter [ˈsfɪŋktə(r)] n. [解剖] 括约肌；

原句：Unlike a bimbo box or a Burb beater, the Deliverator’s car unloads that power through gaping, gleaming, polished sphincters.

□ readout [ˈriːdaʊt] n. 读出；读出器；

原句：The pizza box is a plastic carapace now, corrugated for stiffness, a little LED readout glowing on the side, telling the Deliverator how many trade imbalance-producing minutes have ticked away since the fateful phone call.

□ electromechanical [ɪˈlektrəʊmɪˈkænɪkəl] adj. [电][机] 电动机械的，[机] 机电的；

原句：As he scrunches to a stop, the electromechanical hatch on the flank of his car is already opening to reveal his empty pizza slots, the door clicking and folding back in on itself like the wing of a beetle.

□ expectancy [ɪkˈspektənsi] n. 期待，期望；

原句：Those burger flippers might have a better life expectancy—but what kind of life is it anyway, you have to ask yourself.

□ subcategory [ˈsʌbˌkætəɡəri] n. 子范畴；亚类；

原句：The Deliverator belongs to an elite order, a hallowed subcategory.

□ inequity [ɪnˈekwəti] n. 不公平，不公正；

□ flipper [ˈflɪpə(r)] n. 鳍状肢；鳍；烤饼；胖听罐头；vi. 靠鳍足（或鸭甲板）行动；adj. 无礼的；

原句：Other people—store clerks, burger flippers, software engineers, the whole vocabulary of meaningless jobs that make up Life in America-other people just rely on plain old competition.

□ contrail [ˈkɒntreɪl] n. 凝结尾；航迹云；凝迹；

□ chestnut [ˈtʃesnʌt] n. 栗子；栗色；[园艺]栗树；栗色马；adj. 栗色的；

原句：The billboard is a classic, a chestnut, not a figment of some fleeting Mafia promotional campaign.

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