形容一件事情遥遥无期，我们总是会说“要等到猴年马月啊？”，可是大家知道吗？猴年马月真的来了！有网友表示：终于等到你！还好没放弃！

“猴年马月”的英文怎么说呢？比较恶搞的一种译法是“god knows when”，但地道的表达应该是俚语till the cows come home.

Cows are notoriously languid creatures and make their way home at their own unhurried pace. That's certainly the imagery behind 'till the cows come home' or 'until the cows come home', but the precise time and place of the coining of this colloquial phrase isn't known. It was certainly before 1829 though, and may well have been in Scotland. The phrase appeared in print in The Times in January that year, when the paper reported a suggestion of what the Duke of Wellington should do if he wanted to maintain a place as a minister in Peel's cabinet:

实际上，猴年马月并不是真的遥遥无期，而是每逢12年就有一次，今年的猴年马月开始于2016年6月5日，结束于2016年7月3日。

我们都知道老祖宗的12生肖纪年法，而12生肖不光能纪年，还可以纪月。每年农历正月到腊月对应的属相依次是：虎、兔、龙、蛇、马、羊、猴、鸡、狗、猪、鼠、牛。

因此，每年都会有一个马月，而正巧遇到了猴年，就有了猴年马月。

虽然我们中国人说猴年马月，而在英语中，却是“驴年”：donkey's years。“驴年”是个啥？让老外给你们解释一下吧！

A query asked if the British slang term for 'a very long time' was donkey's years or donkey's ears. My first thoughts were, "donkey's years of course - what would ears have to do with it?". It turns out that I was being rather hasty. Donkey's years is now the more commonly used slang term when meaning 'a long time', but donkey's ears, although used little in recent years, has been a jokey alternative for some time - from the early 20th century.

一份问卷调查了英国描述“很长时间”的俚语俚语是donkey's years还是donkey's ears。我的第一反应就是：“当然是donkey's years”，这和耳朵有什么关系？但事实证明我还是太草率了。donkey's years在现在，普遍被用作表示“很长时间”，donkey's ears虽然如今用的很少，但从20世纪初期开始，被用作一种滑稽的替代。

Donkey's ears works as rhyming slang whereas donkey's years doesn't. In rhyming slang the last word of a short phrase is rhymed with the word that gives the slang meaning.

donkey's ears作为一种同韵俚语，然而donkey's years却不是。在同韵俚语中，短语中的最后一个词和俚语意思的词押韵。

注：为什么老外形容时间长用的是驴子呢？因为驴走路总是缓慢拖着步子，要完成一段旅程实在要花上太长的时间了！于是这个词就应运而生了！

例句：I haven't heard that one for donkey's ears.（我已经很久没听说过这事儿了）

猴年马月都到了，从前的承诺都兑现了吗？从前的愿望都实现了吗？