Enjoying...and Coveting The Human Guinea Pig's Writing Life

I was feeling melancholy, and something reminded me of the Human Guinea Pig, Emily Yoffe, who writes for Slate magazine. I heard her on NPR a couple of years ago and laughed until the kids grew concerned about my ability to maneuver the car through traffic.

Perhaps on that melancholy afternoon years after my introduction to Yoffe via the airwaves, my psyche instinctively knew I needed to laugh, and that Human Guinea Pig guffawing would be just the thing to shake me from blue to a brighter yellow.

The tag line in the heading of her columns reads "humiliating myself for fun and profit." She describes the goal of her efforts as doing something Slate's readers are curious about but have too much dignity to do themselves. She's been a street mime for a day, posed nude for art students, gone ice fishing and slinked around Hollywood as a paparazzo armed with nothing more than a digital camera.

I logged onto Slate.com to select some of her columns (this link takes you to her list). When you're midnight blue, it's hard to guffaw. That day I tittered at some, I suppose. Maybe a chortle. Eventually I was experiencing the cathartic, gut-level laugh that is hard to come by during these manic days of parenting-in-fall. I loved her comparisons and comical descriptions mingled with some lighthearted self-deprecation. I coveted her job.

That first day I heard her on NPR, I thought, "Why didn't I think of that? I'd love her job!" Taking on some crazy assignment just so I could write about it? That's livin'!

I tried to invent some variation on the idea, but never really came up with anything that wouldn't seem like, well, just another human guinea pig...only in the Midwest instead the East Coast. Of course, I suppose the same concept with a different name wouldn't be much different from all the American Idol spinoffs. It's always the same concept, slightly repackaged, with a different logo, theme song, host and set of judges. Maybe I should just become another human guinea pig, writing a slightly different column topped with a barely disguised title change and suspiciously similar tag line. Blog readers could send me ideas to try out. It could have some kind of a mom-twist, even though Yoffe's often do, as well. It would be fun. I draw the line at modeling nude for art students, however. So my own twist on the concept would have to build in natural limits.

Meanwhile, I read what she does and grin.

Her recent post about training her beagle using Cesar Millan's dog whisperer techniques was interesting--not as humorous as most (perhaps because she didn't actually make a fool out of herself), but well done. http://www.slate.com/id/2149364/