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Baring
Your Soul--
and Much, Much More
by Mad Dog
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The experiment is designed to see how fast men
get yanked away by their wives. Just kidding. Actually no guy in his right mind would stop
to watch this if his wife was tagging along. |
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People in glass houses shouldnt, well, they shouldnt do a lot of
things. Take it from Daniela Tobar, a 21-year-old actress in Santiago, Chile whos
spending two weeks in an 8-foot by 8-foot glass-enclosed building while people watch her
go about her life. I suspect throwing stones is the least of her worries. Guys drooling on
the windows is probably one of the most.
Daniela has been eating, sleeping, cleaning, going to the
bathroomeverything youd do in a normal dayin front of anyone who feels
like standing on the sidewalk watching. Its much like the windows that look into the
studio of The Today Show except no ones holding up signs saying "Hi" to
their family in Moose Butt, Minnesota and luckily Al Roker keeps his clothes on.
The glass house experiment is the brainchild of architect
Arturo "Who Doesnt Want To See A Babe Nude?" Torres. Its designed to
see how fast men get yanked away by their wives. Just kidding. Actually no guy in his
right mind would stop to watch this if his wife was tagging along. According to Torres
its supposed to gauge how people feel about a persons right to privacy.
Uh-huh.
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This is pretty brave of her considering most people have a hard time going out of the
house if theyre having a bad hair day, better yet have strangers watch them wipe
themselves. |
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Personally, I
wouldnt want people to see my more intimate habits. Theres a reason personal
privacy is called that. Its not like I have disgusting habitsnot in my mind,
anywaybut like most people, I do things when Im alone that I dont want
others to see. Its not that they embarrass me, its that the very act of other
people knowing about them makes me self-consciously aware of them and that makes them seem
less honest. Kind of an "Im O.K. As Long As You Dont Know How Weird I
Am" sort of thing. Face it, I really have no desire to stop and analyze why I often
wear a hat when I write and why its ability to make me write better wears off after a
while, meaning I have to constantly be on the lookout for new, effective Writing Hats. It
just is, it works, and thats all I need to know.
Think about it, dont you get grossed out when youre
stopped at a traffic light and you look over to see the driver in the next car picking his
or her nose, as if a car with 360-degree windows somehow affords privacy? And admit it,
youre not nearly as grossed out by what theyre doing as you are knowing how
many times youve done the same thing. Now think about poor Daniela clipping her
toenails, popping pimples on her nose, and going to the bathroom. You can date a woman for
years before seeing these things, yet Danielas doing them in front of people the
very first time they lay eyes on her.
This is pretty brave of her considering most people have a
hard time going out of the house if theyre having a bad hair day, better yet have
strangers watch them wipe themselves. A study done at Yale University (motto: "The
Other Harvard") showed that people felt less smart, less capable, more embarrassed
and less sociable on a bad hair day, which was defined as any time their hair stuck out,
was messy, was badly cut, or otherwise required a hat so as not to look like Albert
Einstein when he woke up in the morning. Or went to sleep at night. Or anytime in between.
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Daniela may make a few bucks off this yet. Remember, people have launched careers based on
a lot less (see: Monica Lewinsky, Mahir the Turkish Lover, Paulie Shore, etc). |
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Its not
surprising that people are interested in watching Daniela go about her daily life. And not
just for the reasons youre snickering about. After all, Real World continues to get
good ratings on MTV after eight seasons despite the fact that their world is hardly real,
what with 33 camera, sound, light, makeup, and cue card people hovering over them 24-hours
a day. And live webcams on the Internet have become big business, proving that people will
pay good money to watch others sleep, eat, and not have the wild sex one hoped they would
have. Get used to it, voyeurism is the Rubiks Cube of the 00s.
But at least Daniela isnt charging money, which is probably
because theyre doing this in Chile rather than the United States, where it would be
sponsored by Windex. But thats not to say Daniela may not make a few bucks off this.
Remember, people have launched careers based on a lot less (see: Monica Lewinsky, Mahir
the Turkish Lover, Paulie Shore, etc). For starters she might consider letting the glass
house go completely to pot in the hopes that shell win Ace Hardwares Americas
Messiest Room Contest. After all, it doesnt say North America. Or she
could submit video footage of her to Ed McMahons new website, www.nextbigstar.com,
so she could become the next Sinbad. Or Sawyer Brown. Or Mrs. McMahon.
But chances are Danielas in her glass house because she
believes in it. Even so, I suspect that when its over shell walk out, do her
best Chilean Greta Garbo imitation saying, "I vant to be left alone", and lock
herself behind some steel doors for a while. Personally, Im going to miss seeing her
floss her teeth and eat that piece of popcorn that was stuck between them.
©2000 Mad Dog Productions, Inc. All
Rights Reserved.
These columns appear in better newspapers across the country. Read
them while sitting in your glass bathroom.
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