"The Guinea Pig Diaries, My Life as an Experiment" by A. J. Jacobs Simon & Schuster 234 pages $25
Jacobs is an Editor-at-Large for Esquire magazine and has written two previous books -- for his first he read the entire Encyclopedia Britannica; for his second he followed all of the rules found in the Bible religiously. (Sorry, couldn't resist.)
In this volume, he conducts nine different experiments using himself as the instigator. An amusing chapter concerned his out-sourcing his life to a pair of Bangladesh firms -- Brickwords and Your Man In India. The people at these films ordered things for him, scheduled him, answered e-mails, argued with his wife for him...
In another, he successfully gate-crashed the Oscars. He looked identical to Australian actor, who had elected to stay home Down Under. From the limo to the end of this adventure, he's taken as the real deal. At first he liked the attention, but then he got tired of the sycophants surrounding him.
He discovered that George Washington had written a list of 110 rules for good manners. Washington's rules are rather basic in spots -- don't scratch your privates in public struck me as unnecessary.
It's an interesting book, but don't try to plow through it in one day. Jacobs is thorough and quotes a lot of other different authors' theories which makes for a long read.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment