By fourth grade Wozniak became, as he put it, one of the "electronics kids."
到了四年級,沃茲尼亞克成為了他自稱為“電子小孩”的一類人。
He had an easier time making eye contact with a transistor than with a girl, and he developed the chunky and stooped look of a guy who spends most of his time hunched over circuit boards.
對他來說,盯著一只晶體管要比跟一個姑娘眉來眼去來得容易,他就以矮矮胖胖、有點兒駝背的形象示眾,大多數時間他都埋頭于電路板中。
At the same age when Jobs was puzzling over a carbon microphone that his dad couldn't explain,
在喬布斯還在為了一個連他父親都解釋不清的碳精話筒而迷惑的年紀,
Wozniak was using transistors to build an intercom system featuring amplifiers, relays, lights, and buzzers that connected the kids' bedrooms of six houses in the neighborhood.
沃茲尼亞克已經在使用晶體管搭建對講系統了,這個系統帶有放大器、繼電器、燈和蜂鳴器,連接了相鄰的6座房子中孩子們的臥室。
And at an age when Jobs was building Heathkits, Wozniak was assembling a transmitter and receiver from Hallicrafters, the most sophisticated radios available.
喬布斯還在玩希斯工具盒的時候,沃茲尼亞克已經在組裝來自世界上最先進的無線電制造商哈里克拉夫特(Hallicrafters)的發射器和接收器了,他還和父親一起獲得了業余無線電執照。
Woz spent a lot of time at home reading his father's electronics journals, and he became enthralled by stories about new computers, such as the powerful ENIAC.
沃茲花了大量的時間在家閱讀父親的電子學期刊,他著迷于關于新式計算機的那些故事,比如強大的埃尼阿克(ENIAC)。
Because Boolean algebra came naturally to him, he marveled at how simple, rather than complex, the computers were.
在接觸到布爾代數之后,他驚奇地發現其實計算機系統一點兒也不復雜,而是非常簡單。
In eighth grade he built a calculator that included one hundred transistors, two hundred diodes, and two hundred resistors on ten circuit boards.
八年級的時候,他基于二進制理論造出了一臺計算器,把100只晶體管、200只二極管、200只電阻裝在了10塊電路板上。
It won top prize in a local contest run by the Air Force, even though the competitors included students through twelfth grade.
在當地一項由空軍舉辦的賽事上,盡管參賽者中還有十二年級的學生,但這臺計算器還是贏得了最高獎。
Woz became more of a loner when the boys his age began going out with girls and partying, endeavors that he found far more complex than designing circuits.
與沃茲同齡的男孩已開始跟女孩約會、參加各種派對,而他覺得這些都比設計電路更為復雜,他顯得更加不合群了。
"Where before I was popular and riding bikes and everything, suddenly I was socially shut out," he recalled. "It seemed like nobody spoke to me for the longest time."
“之前我還挺受歡迎的,但突然間我就被孤立了,”他回憶說,“很長的一段時間都沒有人跟我說話。”
He found an outlet by playing juvenile pranks.
他找到了一個發泄的辦法:
In twelfth grade he built an electronic metronome—one of those tick-tick-tick devices that keep time in music class—and realized it sounded like a bomb.
搞些幼稚的惡作劇。高中四年級的時候,他做了一個電子節拍器——音樂教室里用來打拍子的、會發出“滴答”聲的裝置。然后他意識到“滴答”聲聽上去很像是炸彈定時器的聲音。
So he took the labels off some big batteries, taped them together, and put it in a school locker; he rigged it to start ticking faster when the locker opened.
于是他把一些大塊電池的標簽撕掉,把它們綁在一起,然后放進了學校的儲物柜里。他設定好裝置,一旦柜門被打開,“滴答”頻率就會變高。
Later that day he got called to the principal's office. He thought it was because he had won, yet again, the school's top math prize. Instead he was confronted by the police.
那天晚些時候,他被叫到了校長辦公室。他還以為是因為他又一次獲得了學校的最高數學獎。然而,等待他的是警察。
The principal had been summoned when the device was found, bravely ran onto the football field clutching it to his chest, and pulled the wires off.
校長布呂德先生(Mr. Bryld)在裝置剛被發現時就被叫到了現場,他一把抓起那個玩意兒,緊貼胸口,抱著它勇敢地跑到了操場,然后把上面的電線拆掉。
Woz tried and failed to suppress his laughter. He actually got sent to the juvenile detention center, where he spent the night.
沃茲強忍著,但還是控制不住笑了出來。那天他真的被送到了青少年拘留中心,在那兒過了一晚上。
It was a memorable experience. He taught the other prisoners how to disconnect the wires leading to the ceiling fans and connect them to the bars so people got shocked when touching them.
沃茲認為那是一段難忘的經歷。他在里面教其他犯人把通到天花板上風扇的電線接到鐵窗上,這樣一且有人碰到就會被電擊一下。
Getting shocked was a badge of honor for Woz. He prided himself on being a hardware engineer, which meant that random shocks were routine.
對沃茲來說,被電擊就好像是獲得榮譽獎章一樣。作為一名硬件工程師讓他很自豪,但這也意味著觸電是家常便飯。
He once devised a roulette game where four people put their thumbs in a slot; when the ball landed, one would get shocked.
他曾經發明過一種輪盤賭游戲:四個人把拇指按在槽里,球落下之后,其中的一個會被電到。
"Hardware guys will play this game, but software guys are too chicken," he noted.
“搞硬件的人才愿意玩這個游戲,搞軟件的都太膽小了。”他這么強調。