Cat videos are swamping the internet. Search on YouTube for ‘cats’ and you’ll get 11.3 million hits. Fat cats, cute cats, ugly cats, cartoon cats: we can’t get enough of them.
网上到处都是关于喵星人的视频,在YouTube网站搜索关键词“猫”,你可以看到1亿1300万的点击量。胖猫、可爱的猫、长得丑的猫、卡通猫:我们就是喜欢喵星人,怎么都不够。
Any enterprising puss that could film and upload its own home movies would be an instant internet sensation. Horizon: The Secret Life Of the Cat (BBC2) revealed the science that might make this possible.
要是有事业心的喵星人能拍下自己的家庭影片并上传网络,肯定马上会成为网络热门关注。好在科学让这成为可能,BBC二台制作了一部喵星人纪录片《地平线:猫咪的秘密生活》。
In the Surrey commuter-belt village of Shamley Green, 50 pet moggies were fitted with GPS trackers that pinpointed their position to within a few centimetres as they prowled on their nightly rounds.
在萨里郡通勤居民区Shamley Green村,50只猫咪被戴上了GPS追踪器,当这些猫咪在夜间潜行时,这些追踪器可以准备定位它们的位置,误差仅为几厘米。
The most adventurous were given tiny collar-cameras to wear, offering viewers a cats-eye view of the world.
最刺激的是给它们戴上非常小的颈圈摄像头,让观看视频的人可以通过猫眼看世界。
The cats were very much the focus of the programme: we didn’t learn their owners’ names. Instead, we met Ginger, who repeatedly snuck into his neighbour’s garden at 4am to fight the resident cat. Phoebe and Kato worked out a “timeshare” of their territory so they were never patrolling at the same time. There was Claude, who crept into a stranger’s house each night to steal food; and Molly, who travelled two hours from home to hunt from a birds’ nest in a wood.
猫咪们是整个节目的重点,我们都不知道他们主人的名字。介绍一下它们吧:这只叫Ginger的猫,多次在凌晨四点钟溜进邻居家的花园,和他们家的猫打架;Phoebe 和 Kato 这两只猫在他们的领地上则是“分时度假”,所以我们从来看不到它们俩同时出来巡逻;这只叫Claude的猫,每晚爬进一个陌生人的家里偷食物;还有这只叫Molly的,到离家两小时路程的一个小树林里去捣鸟窝。
The documentary contained few surprises. Cats, as their owners already guessed, like to sneak through next-door’s cat-flap and raid the food bowl; they hiss and yowl and then scarper when they meet one another; hunting mice is, mostly, too much trouble for them.
纪录片中可能并没有太多惊喜。就像它们的主人已经猜到的那样,猫咪会通过猫洞溜到隔壁邻居家,偷袭食盆里的猫粮;它们遇到同类时,会发出嘶嘶声和号叫声,然后就默默溜走;对大部分的猫咪来说,抓老鼠是挺麻烦的事儿。