見見老鼠凱薩琳和大象馬克。凱薩琳非常勇敢又喜歡冒險,但馬克的個性十分害羞,對許多事情都感到害怕。不過,朋友都喜歡黏在一塊兒,所以凱薩琳走到哪兒,馬克就會跟到哪兒。有時候,他們也會碰上非常棘手的情況...
Office life 辦公室生活
It was summer vacation and Kathleen had taken a job as a receptionist at Fleesum and Runn law firm in the city. In the elevator to the 30th floor she felt nervous for the first time in her life. Finally the doors opened and she stepped into the office.
“Hello, my name’s Kathleen and I’m the new receptionist,” she said in a quiet voice. A tall lion with a thick moustache looked over his glasses at her. “A mouse? They sent me a mouse!” he said with a raised eyebrow. His name was Reginald Runn, one of the bosses at the firm. “That’s right, sir. My name is Kathleen. What can I do for you?” “You can start by making me a coffee. But hurry up — I have a meeting in two minutes,” he growled.
When Kathleen got to the coffee machine there was already a long line of people waiting. She forced her way to the front of the line and started pushing the buttons on the machine. Suddenly a jet of steaming hot coffee gushed out of the machine, covering a nearby ostrich in coffee. “What on earth are you doing?” the ostrich said as coffee ran down his tie. Kathleen just grabbed the coffee and ran back to Mr Runn’s office.
Mr Runn did not look happy. “It seems like making coffee is too difficult for you, so your next job will be considerably easier. All you have to do is switch on this tape recorder and record my meeting,” he said. Kathleen started the tape recorder and the lawyers started talking. The meeting was so boring that Kathleen fell asleep. When she woke up, all the lawyers were staring at her. Reginald Runn began to speak. “You silly mouse! The batteries ran out halfway through the meeting! We need to teach you a lesson, so your next task will be something you will never forget…”
(JOHN PHILLIPS, STAFF WRITER)
時值暑假,凱薩琳得到一份在城裡的福禮森和朗恩法律事務所當接待員的工作。搭上前往三十樓電梯的她,生平第一次覺得緊張。終於,電梯門打開了,她走進辦公室。
她小聲地說:「哈囉,我叫凱薩琳,我是新來的接待員。」一頭留著濃密八字鬍的高大獅子透過眼鏡看了看凱薩琳,然後挑著眉說:「一隻老鼠?他們派一隻老鼠給我!」他叫羅吉諾.朗恩,是這間事務所的負責人之一。「是的,先生。我叫凱薩琳,有什麼可以幫忙的嗎?」他吼道:「妳可以先幫我泡一杯咖啡,但動作快點—我兩分鐘後就要開會了。」
凱薩琳走到咖啡機時,已經有一堆人排隊等著泡咖啡了。她擠到隊伍前面,開始操作咖啡機。忽然,咖啡機噴出了熱騰騰的咖啡,噴得身旁一隻鴕鳥滿身。「妳究竟在幹什麼啊?」這隻鴕鳥說話時,咖啡一面從他的領帶上流下。凱薩琳拿了咖啡就跑回朗恩先生的辦公室。
朗恩先生神情不悅地說:「看來泡咖啡對妳來說太困難了,所以妳的下一項工作將會簡單許多。妳只要按下這台錄音機的按鈕,錄下會議內容就行了。」凱薩琳按下錄音機,律師們開始談話。這場會議實在太無聊了,凱薩琳竟然睡著了。等她醒來,發現所有律師正盯著她看。羅吉諾.朗恩開口說:「妳這隻笨老鼠!錄音機在會議中途就沒電了!我們必須好好給妳上一課,所以妳的下一個任務將讓妳永生難忘…」
(翻譯:袁星塵)
A: Artificial intelligence technology has been causing controversy lately: a student was caught cheating with AI to win the grand prize in an art contest. B: That’s so absurd. Does this mean that AI paints better than humans? A: Maybe. Luckily, the student was later disqualified. B: And more absurdly, it’s becoming more and more popular to use AI technology to “resurrect” people. A: Yeah, some netizens even posted videos featuring the late singer CoCo Lee, who was “resurrected” by them with AI software. A: 人工智慧的爭議不斷,有學生違規使用AI參加美術展,甚至贏得首獎。 B: 真誇張,這是不是代表AI比人類還強大? A: 或許吧,幸好得獎資格被取消。 B: 還有更誇張的︰讓死者重現的「AI復活」技術越來越熱門。 A: 對啊,還有網友製作已故歌后李玟「復活」的影片呢! (By Eddy Chang, Taipei Times/台北時報張聖恩)
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