標題：Doing his darnedest

Doing one's darnedest: 全力以赴
to put forth the utmost amount of energy or effort toward some task or goal.
Eg: Money is a little tight at the moment, but I'll do my darndest to be there for your wedding.

America’s 41st president, the last of his kind, was 94

The last of his kind 絕無僅有的老布什

Wherever he went, as America’s president or before it, George Herbert Walker Bush usually carried a felt-tipped pen and a supply of notecards.

第一句以意像化的形式向讀者展現了一個老布什的形象。無論走到哪里，作為美國總統和作為平民的時候，老布什總是隨身帶著一支簽字筆和一沓記事卡，也引起了讀者特別好奇，到底這些記事卡是干嘛的呢？

On these he wrote letters. Some were thank-yous; others a clumsy, but courteous, attempt to get his views across to other people; yet others just a “good to see you” kind of thing.

原來他是用來寫信。有一些是感謝卡，有政治觀點，也有一些只是簡單的問候-"見到你很高興“
clumsy but courteous 禮貌而不失尷尬

• clumsy這個詞在別的場景下通常是指笨手笨腳的或者笨拙的，這里更接近于"得罪人的”
  Definition: a clumsy action or statement is said or done carelessly or badly, and likely to upset someone
  Eg: David made a clumsy attempt to comfort us
• courteous有禮貌的, polite 的高級說法。
  Definition: polite and showing respect for other people
  Eg: The students are well-educated and courteous.
• get his views across 把...講清楚，在寫作或者口語當中非常好用，是communicate的結果。
  Definition :succeed in communicating an idea or piece of information to someone, or to be communicated successfully
  Eg: It took me ages to get my point across.

When the time came to write his presidential memoirs, to salve some of that desperate hurt after Bill Clinton thrashed him in 1992, he published instead 600-plus pages of correspondence.

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• salve 安慰(良心)；減輕(內疚感)
  Definition Heal or remedy (a disease, sin, sorrow, etc.)
  常見的用法是 salve your conscience, you do it in order to feel less guilty.
• thrash輕松擊敗，以大比分戰勝
  Definition If one player or team thrashes another in a game or contest, they defeat them easily or by a large score. (informal)
  Eg: Brazil thrashed Italy 5–0.
• correspondence 往來書信，Letters的高級說法，
  Eg: He always replied to his correspondence

They ranged from doting letters to newborn grandchildren to his worries, as a young seaman in 1943, that his girlfriend Barbara, “so darn attractive”, would drop him while he was away; from his attempt to explain the Watergate scandal to his four young sons, to his mortified account of throwing up in 1992 on the Japanese prime minister, “the damnedest experience”.

這一段具體地寫出這些信件的內容，可以看出Bush是非常有性情的人，有充滿寵溺的給剛出生的孫子的信，也有當水手時，害怕他女朋友Barbara甩掉他的真實，也有試圖向他四個兒子解釋水門事件的。

• doting 寵溺的，spoiling
  ** Definition**a doting mother, husband, or friend, you mean that they show a lot of love for someone
  Eg: His doting parents bought him his first racing bike at 13.
• mortified
  Definition: they feel extremely offended, ashamed, or embarrassed.
  Eg: I was mortified to find that everyone else was wearing evening dress.
• his mortified account of throwing up in 1992 on the Japanese prime minister
  這里有個老布什的小囧事。就是在1992年1月8日，老布什在參加日本首相Kiichi Miyazawa的宴會時暈倒了，更囧的是在暈倒之前吐在了Miyazawa的大腿上。他稱之為難以置信（darndest) 的經歷,現在看來也是非常窘迫的。這件事后來成為了喜劇演員們的素材，當之無愧地當選為2007年USA Today 評選的“二十五個公眾糗事"之一。
  
  vomiting.jpg

He admitted that some of the letters were nutty. But they were also of the moment. As he said, “It’s all about heartbeat.”

他承認有一些信看起來非常瘋狂，但是他們都是當下的心情。

• nutty 瘋狂，是nut的形容詞
  Definition: very strange or foolish.