024 一个惊喜

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" Hey!" I exclaimed, blurting out my story idea

“嘿！”我脱口而出，把我的故事点子嚷嚷了出来。

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" Let's write a story about a giant talking vacuum cleaner

“我们写一个关于巨型会说话的吸尘器的故事吧。

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It can suck up the whole world!"

它能把整个世界都吸走！”

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" Huh?" Molly blinked at me

“嗯？”莫莉朝我眨了眨眼。

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Then she shook her head

然后她摇了摇头。

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" No, Iggy. The vaccum cleaner sounds like a monster

“不，伊吉。这个吸尘器听起来像个怪物。

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I'm not writing a story about a monster!"

我不想写关于怪物的故事！”

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At lunch we talked some more about my idea

午饭时，我们又讨论了一会儿我的点子。

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Molly kept pointing out problems with it

莫莉不停地指出其中的问题。

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" The giant vacuum cleaner can't suck up the whole world, Iggy," she said

“那个巨型吸尘器不可能吸走整个世界，伊吉。”她说。

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" If it did, there wouldn't be a story because nothing would be left."

如果它真的那样，就没有故事可写了，因为什么都不会剩下。

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I knew Molly was right

我就知道莫莉是对的。

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I decided that thinking of a plot for a story was even harder than inventing!

我认定，构思一个故事情节比搞发明还要难！

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Other kids were talking about plot ideas too

其他孩子也在讨论情节构思。

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" Mrs. Romano said we should bounce our ideas off each other," said Colby

“Romano老师说我们应该互相交流想法，”科尔比说。

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" Boing!" said Jake, bouncing a grape off Colby's head

“砰！”杰克说着，把一颗葡萄弹到了科尔比头上。

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" She said to bounce story ideas, not food!" said Kristin

“她说的是碰撞想法，不是弹食物！”克里斯汀说。

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After school we stopped at Molly's apartment to ask if Molly could come to my apartment

放学后，我们顺便去了莫莉的公寓，问莫莉能不能来我的公寓。

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Caswell and Lucy were in the living room, watching Monster Madness again

卡斯韦尔和露西在客厅里，又在看《怪兽疯狂》。

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Lucy just stared at the TV screen

露西只是盯着电视屏幕。

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" Iggy, your mom wants to see you and Molly right away

"伊吉，你妈妈让你和莫莉马上过去一下。

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She has a surprise."

她有个惊喜。"

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Molly and I raced over to my apartment

我和莫莉飞奔回了我的公寓。

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" What's the surprise, Mom?" I blurted out

"什么惊喜呀，妈妈？"我脱口而出。

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" I can't tell you yet," said Mom

"我现在还不能告诉你，"妈妈说。

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" But we're going somewhere fun

"不过我们要去一个好玩的地方。

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Caswell can come too, if he wants."

卡斯韦尔如果想去，也可以一起来。"

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Caswell decided he could miss the rest of Monster Madness for today

卡斯韦尔觉得，今天的《怪物狂欢》剩下的部分不看也行。

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Soon all of us, including Lucy, were walking down the busy street

很快，我们所有人，包括露西，走在了熙熙攘攘的街道上。

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We passed Bubbles Bath Shop and waved to Mr. Chen

我们路过泡泡浴商店，朝陈先生挥了挥手。

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We passed our school and waved to Mrs. Romano, who was just leaving for the day

我们路过学校，向正要下班的罗马诺老师挥手。

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At last my mom stopped in front of a shop I had never seen before

最后，妈妈在一家我从没见过的商店前停了下来。

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A sign read: " Garden Gate Children's Bookstore

一块招牌上写着：“花园门儿童书店。

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Author Story Hour Today!"

今日有作家故事会！”

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" It's a new bookstore," my mom explained

“这是一家新书店，”妈妈解释说。

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" And we're just in time for story hour."

我们正好赶上故事会。

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We entered through a door that looked like a garden gate

我们从一个看起来像花园门的入口走了进去。

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Kids were sitting on the floor, and a lady was sitting on a chair in front of them

孩子们坐在地板上，一位女士坐在他们前面的椅子上。

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" I'm Matilda Mackey," she said

“我是马蒂尔达·麦基，”她说。

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" I'm going to read my new book, The Wicky Wacky School."

“我打算读我的新书，《古怪学校》。”

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Matilda Mackey's book was about a school where weird things happen

玛蒂尔达·麦基写的书讲的是一个学校里发生怪事的故事。

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One day the teachers turn into monkeys, and the main character has to figure out how to change them back

有一天，老师们变成了猴子，主人公得想办法把他们变回来。

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She solves the problem when she realizes the teachers have been eating too many bananas

她发现老师们吃了太多香蕉，于是解决了问题。

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I thought the story was really funny and had a lot of suspense

我觉得这个故事非常有趣，而且悬念重重。

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Suddenly I got an idea

突然，我有了个主意。

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I leaned over to Molly

我凑向莫莉。

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" Maybe Mrs. Mackey can help us think of a plot for our story!"

“也许麦基夫人能帮我们想个故事的情节！”

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Molly nodded and gave me the thumbs-up sign

莫莉点点头，对我竖起了大拇指。

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After Mrs. Mackey finished reading, Molly and I rushed up to her

麦基夫人读完故事后，我和莫莉冲到她面前。

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" My name is Iggy," I said." I'm an inventor."

“我叫伊吉，”我说，“我是个发明家。”

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" And I'm Molly," said Molly

“我是莫莉，”莫莉说。

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" I'm just a regular person."

“我只是个普通人。”

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" We're writing a story in school," I explained

“我们在学校写故事，”我解释道。

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" And we can't think of a good plot," added Molly

“而且我们想不出好情节，”莫莉补充说。

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Mrs. Mackey's eyes lit up

麦基夫人的眼睛亮了起来。

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" Here's what you have to do," she said

“你们要这样做，”她说。

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" Ask yourself what the character wants more than anything in the world

“问问自己，这个角色比世界上任何东西都更想要什么。

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And then give her a huge problem to solve."

然后给她一个巨大的难题去解决。”

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Somehow Mrs. Mackey's words sounded familiar

不知怎的，麦基夫人的话听起来很耳熟。

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Then I realized why

然后我明白了为什么。

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It was just like my life!

这就像我的生活！

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I always wanted to invent things to help people

我总是想发明东西来帮助别人。

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And I always had a huge problem:

而且我总有个大问题：

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my inventions turned out to be flops!

我的发明总是失败！