刚开始，小明百听不厌怀表的声音，他想听，爷爷要和他交换条件：说要乖才让他听。要怎么乖？当然要听爷爷的话，更具体地说，那就是要替爷爷掏耳朵。爷爷有喜欢掏耳朵的坏习惯，奶奶死后就没人替他掏耳朵了。小明八岁了，有一天爷爷耳朵痒得不得了，他冒险地想到小明，要他试着轻轻替他掏耳朵。开始时小明觉得好玩，他小心地试了一下，爷爷竟惊艳地称赞他手巧，很满意地赏了钱，让他去租连环漫画看。从此之后，这一份替爷爷掏耳朵的工作就牢牢地跟在小明的身上了。

At first, Xiaoming wished he could listen to the ticking watch every waking minute; but his grandpa laid down a condition: He could only listen to it if he was a good boy. Just what did that mean? Doing what Grandpa asked him to do, specifically cleaning Grandpa's ears. That had long been one of the old man's guilty pleasures, but after Grandma died, there was no one to do it for him. One day, when his ears itched almost unbearably, he entertained the risky thought of asking Xiaoming, who was eight, to gently clean them for him. Thinking this could be fun, Xiaoming gave it a try, cautiously. To Grandpa's pleasant surprise, he did a skillful job, earning the old man's praise and money to rent some comic books. From then on, no one but Xiaoming cleaned Grandpa's ears。

guilty pleasure是什么意思？

My comments:

Guilty pleasures are one’s peculiar, often secret pleasures, things we do that are pleasurable but which make us feel guilty at the same time.

Why guilty?

They make us feel guilty because somehow, we feel we’re not supposed to do them.

Here, grandpa enjoys getting his ears cleaned. If you ask a doctor, any doctor, they may advise against it – cleaning one’s ears too often and without sedulous care may lead to many problems, medical and otherwise.

However, getting one’s ears cleaned is nothing to be ashamed of, that is, in comparison with some other guilty pleasures people have.

Such as married couples having a love affair on the side, for example. It’s something that they enjoy doing, obviously but something that makes them feel guilty as hell. They know they shouldn’t be doing it.

Some of them at any rate. Government officials who keep many young women as modern day concubines by supplying them with houses bought with embezzled money don’t seem to feel any guilt or remorse at all.

That’s why it only feels right whenever one of these corrupt officials is taken to task.

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Go to Zhang Xin's column

本文仅代表作者本人观点，与本网立场无关。欢迎大家讨论学术问题，尊重他人，禁止人身攻击和发布一切违反国家现行法律法规的内容。

About the author:

Zhang Xin（张欣） has been with China Daily since 1988, when he graduated from Beijing Foreign Studies University. Write him at: zhangxin@chinadaily.com.cn, or raise a question for potential use in a future column.