9

Saturday If every night is like Thursday night, I'm not sure how long I can SURVIVE being Löded Diper's roadie. The band wasn't supposed to go onstage at the Headless Chicken until 8:00, but Rodrick was pretty anxious to get everything set up. So we got there two hours ahead of time and started hauling the gear inside, and the band was happy to let the new guy do most of the grunt work. It took over an hour to set up, and the guys wanted to squeeze in some rehearsal time before the crowd started arriving.

星期六 如果每天晚上都跟周四晚上一样，我不知道当脏尿布乐队的场务还能撑多久。 乐队八点才要在“无头鸡”上台，可罗德里克早就急着把一切都布置好。 所以我们提前两小时到了，开始把设备搬进去，乐队的人很乐意让我这个新人干大部分重活。 布置花了一个多小时，大伙还想在观众进场前挤点时间排练。

But then Rodrick realized he forgot his drumsticks at home. And he blamed it on ME, because the said that roadies are responsible for the equipment. There wasn't enough time to go home and get back by showtime, so Mackie started calling around to see if any stores in the area had drumsticks. But I guess the only music store in town closed a few months ago, so that was a dead end. Then Rodrick had an idea. He said there was a Hipp'O" Henry's a few blocks away, and we could get drumsticks THERE. But that didn't make a lot of sense to me, because Hipp'O" Henry's is a pizza place.

可这时候罗德里克才发现，他把鼓棒落家里了。 他还把错推在我身上，说场理本来就该负责看管设备。 演出开始前赶回家拿再回来时间不够，所以麦基开始打电话问这附近有没有店卖鼓棒。 可镇上唯一的琴行几个月前就关门了，这条路走不通。 这时候罗德里克想出个主意。 他说几个街区外有家河马亨利餐厅，我们去那儿弄鼓棒。 可我觉得这说不通啊，河马亨利明明是卖披萨的地方呀。

Rodrick reminded me that every Hipp'O" Henry's has a robot band that comes out three times a night to play a song. And even though it's been a while since I've gone to one of those places, I remember being kind of freaked out by those robots when I was younger. Rodrick's idea was to somehow grab the drumsticks, which sounded a lot like STEALING to me. But Rodrick said we wouldn't be stealing, we'd just be BORROWING them for a few hours. And he said we'd probably have the drumsticks back before anyone even noticed they were gone.

罗德里克提醒我，每家河马亨利都有个机器人乐队，一晚上出来三次演奏歌曲。 虽然我已经好久没去过那儿了，我还记得我小时候被那些机器人吓得够呛。 罗德里克的主意就是去拿那里的鼓棒，这听着跟偷没两样啊。 可罗德里克说这不是偷，我们只是借几个小时而已。 他说我们肯定能在别人发现鼓棒不见之前把它放回去。

I didn't like the sound of that, but it turns out Rodrick couldn't pull this plan off WITHOUT me. Hipp'O" Henry's doesn't allow teenagers in their restaurants, because I guess they've caused a lot of trouble in the past. So Rodrick's plan was to have me go in with Bill and pretend he was my FATHER. This whole thing seemed like a terrible idea to me, but I guess I felt a little responsible for leaving those drumsticks at home, so I went along with the plan.

我觉得这主意不靠谱，但罗德里克说了，这计划没我不行。 河马亨利不让青少年进餐厅，我猜是因为以前青少年在那儿惹了太多麻烦。 所以罗德里克的计划是让我跟比尔进去，让比尔假装是我爸爸。 我也觉得这整个计划糟透了，但我觉得鼓棒落家里我也有点责任，所以就同意按计划来了。

Me and Bill walked past the security guard into the restaurant. But it felt like that guy knew we were up to something because he didn't take his eyes off us once we were inside. So Bill got some tokens and did his best to act like he really was my dad when I got a good score playing Whac-A-Mole. I'M PROUD OF YOU, SON! Me and Bill played Skee-Ball, and things got pretty competitive between us. And I guess we got kind of carried away, because by the time we were through, Bill must've spent at least twenty bucks on tokens.

我和比尔走过保安，进了餐厅。 可我觉得那家伙看穿了我们的心思，我们进去之后他的眼睛就没离开过我们身上。 所以比尔换了些游戏币，我打地鼠得了高分，他就卖力装作真的是我爸爸。 我真为你骄傲啊，儿子！ 我和比尔玩滚球投篮，我俩还玩得挺较真。 我们玩得忘了形，等停下来的时候，比尔至少已经花了二十美元买游戏币了。

We took the tickets we earned to the prize counter, and Bill was disappointed we couldn't afford the lava lamp. So he spent another ten dollars in tokens to play a few more rounds of Skee-Ball, and we won enough tickets to put us over the top. SKEE-BALL WOO-HOO! All that activity made us work up an appetite, so we sat down to order some pizza. And I'll admit, I was having so much fun that I forgot the reason we were there in the first place. But when the curtains opened and the robot band started playing, I remembered what we came to do.

我们拿着赢来的奖券去兑奖台，比尔因为没攒够换熔岩灯的奖券很失望。 所以他又花了十美元买游戏币，多玩了几轮滚球投篮，这下我们攒够了需要的奖券。 滚球投篮，耶！ 玩了这么久我们都饿了，所以我们坐下来点披萨。 我承认，我玩得太开心了，都忘了我们一开始来这儿是干嘛了。 可当幕布拉开，机器人乐队开始演奏的时候，我想起我们来这儿的目的了。