Lesson 10 What’s for supper?

晚餐吃什么？

文章讲解

Fish and chips has always been a favourite dish in Britain, but as the oceans have been overfished, fish has become more and more expensive. So it comes as a surprise to learn that giant fish are terrifying the divers on North Sea oil rigs. Oil rigs have to be repaired frequently and divers, who often have to work in darkness a hundred feet under water, have been frightened out of their wits by giant fish bumping into them as they work. Now they have had special cages made to protect them from these monsters. The fish are not sharks or killer whales, but favourite eating varieties like cod and skate which grow to unnatural sizes, sometimes as much as twelve feet in length. Three factors have caused these fish to grow so large: the warm water round the hot oil pipes under the sea; the plentiful supply of food thrown overboard by the crews on the rigs; the total absence of fishing boats around the oil rigs. As a result, the fish just eat and eat and grow and grow in the lovely warm water. Who eats who?

一、词汇部分
1.chip/tʃɪp/ n. 油煎土豆片
美国：(French) fries
2.overfish/ˌoʊ.vɚˈfɪʃ.ɪŋ/ v. 过度捕捞
3.giant/ˈdʒaɪ.ənt/ adj. 巨大的
4.terrify/ˈter.ə.faɪ/ v. 吓，使恐怖
词根：terr + ify
5.diver/ˈdaɪ.vɚ/ n. 潜小员
6.oil rig /rɪɡ/ 石油钻塔
7.wit/wɪt/ n. （复数）理智，头脑

8.cage/keɪdʒ/ n. 笼
9.shark /ʃɑːrk/ n. 鲨鱼
10.whale/weɪl/ n. 鲸
11.variety/vəˈraɪə.t̬i/ n. 品种
12.cod/kɑːd/ n. 鳕
13.skate/skeɪt/ n. 鳐
14.factor/ˈfæk.tɚ/ n. 因素

15.crew/kruː/ n. 全体工作人员

一、文章讲解
1.Fish and chips has always been a favourite dish in Britain, but as the oceans have been overfished, fish has become more and more expensive. So it comes as a surprise to learn that giant fish are terrifying the divers on North Sea oil rigs.

1)come as a surprise/relief/blow etc
(to somebody)to make someone feel surprised, relieved, disappointed etc

e.g. The decision came as a great relief to us all.
e.g. The news will come as no surprise to his colleagues.

2)feel like a fish out of water 感觉不舒服
E.g. I’m kind of a introverted person. Every time I go to a party, I feel like a fish out of water.

Fishy 可疑的；
e.g. You’ve got to pay attention to Peter. He’s fishy.

2. Oil rigs have to be repaired frequently and divers, who often have to work in darkness a hundred feet under water, have been frightened out of their wits by giant fish bumping into them as they work.

1)并列关系
A …..and B …..

2)work搭配
work up: become upset
e.g. I got all worked up about what my boss said.
e.g. you don’t need to get worked up about it.

Work up: if you work something up, that means to spend time developing it.
e.g. He worked up a presentation for the conference.
e.g. I don’t run much now, but I want to work up to a 10K.

3)Bump into
E.g. I bumped into your mother at the supermarket.
E.g. As I turned round, I bumped into a filing cabinet.

3.Now they have had special cages made to protect them from these monsters. The fish are not sharks or killer whales, butfavourite eating varieties like cod and skatewhich grow to unnatural sizes, sometimes as much as twelve feet in length.

1)过去分词做后置定语
名词＋过去分词

2)protectA from B

3)not….but…不是…而是
4)定语从句：名词＋which…

4.Three factors have caused these fish to grow so large: 1) the warm water round the hot oil pipes under the sea; 2) the plentiful supply of food (thrown overboard by the crews on the rigs); 3) the total absence of fishing boats around the oil rigs. As a result, the fish just eat and eat and grow and grow in the lovely warm water. Who eats who?


扩展阅读：What is it like to live in New York City?

Compared to New York, the rest of the world seems asleep to me.

NYC feels like an engine powering the world, and by living there, you are a cog in the engine. Living anywhere else makes you a passenger.

Some less metaphorical differences:

1.The diversity
I think this is by far New York's biggest difference and biggest strength, but I don't see it mentioned nearly often enough. New York City might be the most diverse place in the world. The racial and ethnic diversity is obvious, and anywhere else in the U.S. now seems overwhelmingly white to me when I visit. But there's also a lot of diversity of age, economic level, and industry. When I visited SF, it seemed like everyone worked in Tech. Here, it's the center of finance, marketing, publishing, fashion, you name it. Each person you meet is likely to be different from you in every single facet possible.

2.The activity
The "city that never sleeps" certainly does sleep - try walking around the east village at 7 am - but it's still much busier than anywhere else. Residents tend to avoid the crazy places tourists frequent, particularly Times Square, but we still pass by thousands of people every day.

3.The creativity
Living in New York is being surrounded by creative types - tech entrepreneurs, actors, dancers, designers, directors, painters, authors. The city itself is a constant reminder of others' creative accomplishments, from the beautiful (and wildly diverse) architecture to the ads for new shows, bands, parties, meetups, museums, and more. Just being here is inspiring and can generate more creative ideas than you could hope to complete in a lifetime.

4.The accessibility
This applies mostly to food, but also to any other product or activity: you can find anything at any time of day. There are 24-hour coffee shops, drug stores, grocery stores, hardware stores. Even the Apple store is open 24 hours, for some reason. I use Seamless to order meals, and it tells me there are over 400 restaurants that are within delivery range of my apartment. Down the street is a Sri Lankan restaurant, a Vietnamese restaurant, Thai, Italian, Japanese, Chinese, Filipino, Indian, Belgian, Mexican, Afghani, Lebanese ... and countless superb bagel and pizza places. There are bookstores open till midnight here. And as a comic book reader, there aren't any other places in the country with such a wide selection of stores.

5.The transportation
90% of all my transportation now is walking. You don't realize how weird cars are until you go without for a few years. Cars are insane. They cause all these problems, but everyone's just gotten used to them. "he was killed in a car accident. Oh well, I guess there's nothing we can do."

6.The safety
In Manhattan at least, I feel much safer than almost anywhere else I've ever been. Now whenever I visit the suburbs or rural areas, it feels super creepy and empty, especially at night. Suburbs at night terrify me. I've wandered into some pretty sketchy areas in SF at night, too. Not in New York.

7.The cultural references
One nice touch is that my home is constantly being referenced by books, tv, comics, movies, and news. I was walking and listening to the (amazing) audiobook of The Magician's Land today, and he mentioned Houston Street AS I WAS WALKING ON HOUSTON STREET. This was not a book about New York, it was a random book. This is just very cool.
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The primary downside of all this, for me at least, is that you can feel pressure to match the incredible achievements of everyone around you - to be as interesting and successful as they are. It's natural to feel overwhelmed, but if you remember that this reaction is just in your head, it can be manageable. But it takes some work.