TED演讲:为什么要制造无用的东西(3)

Since then, I've carved out this little niche¹ for myself on the internet as an inventor of useless machines,

从那时起我在互联网上为自己发掘出了这么一个商机：无用机器发明者，

because as we all know, the easiest way to be at the top of your field is to choose a very small field.

因为大家都知道，成为你所在行业顶尖人物的最简单方法，就是选择一个非常小的行业。

So I run a YouTube channel about my machines, and I've done things like cutting hair with drones.

所以我在运营一个关于我的机器的YouTube频道，我有试过用无人机剪头发。

To a machine that helps me wake up in the morning, Ow! To this machine that helps me chop vegetables.

我还做过一台闹钟机器，噢！还有这台帮我切菜的机器。

I'm not an engineer. I did not study engineering in school. But I was a super ambitious student growing up.

我不是个工程师，我没学过工程学。但我从小就是个特别有远大志向的学生。

In middle school and high school, I had straight A's, and I graduated at the top of my year.

无论初中还是高中，我一路拿的都是A，而且我毕业那年还是名列前茅的。

On the flip² side of that, I struggled with very severe performance anxiety.

但另一面是，我当时有非常严重的表现焦虑。

Here's an email I sent to my brother around that time. "You won't understand how difficult it is for me to tell you, to confess this.

这是一封当时我写给我兄弟的邮件。“你不会明白，光是告诉你这件事，对我来说有多难。

I'm so freaking embarrassed. I don't want people to think that I'm stupid. Now I'm starting to cry too. Damn."

实在是太难堪了。我不希望人们觉得我是个傻子。我现在居然还开始哭了。真讨厌。”

And no, I did not accidentally burn our parents' house down.

别误会，我可没有不小心把爸妈的房子烧了。

The thing I'm writing about in the email and the thing I'm so upset about is that I got a B on a math test.

信里面那件让我如此焦虑不安的事，其实是有一次数学测验我只拿了B。

So something obviously happened between here and here.

所以这两种情况之间一定发生了什么事情。

1 niche   

n.壁龛；合适的职务(环境、位置等)

参考例句：

• Madeleine placed it carefully in the rocky niche. 玛德琳小心翼翼地把它放在岩石壁龛里。
• The really talented among women would always make their own niche.妇女中真正有才能的人总是各得其所。

2 flip   

vt.快速翻动；轻抛；轻拍；n.轻抛；adj.轻浮的

参考例句：

• I had a quick flip through the book and it looked very interesting.我很快翻阅了一下那本书，看来似乎很有趣。
• Let's flip a coin to see who pays the bill.咱们来抛硬币决定谁付钱。