As we’ve discussed, when inspiration strikes I sometimes move too quickly. Excited at the premise of what is to come, I decide I can’t wait another second (or use another brain cell) and immediately pull the trigger, usually to less-than-thrilling results. Typically I am a pretty slow-and-steady decider- two of my lampshades cracked when I moved from Chicago in 2021 and I haven’t felt ready to choose replacements, for instance-but every now and then I get a bug that doesn’t lead to the “the results I want” as much as “immediate disappointment that I’ll reflect on for months.”
Which brings us to our most recent installment:
A few weeks ago my friend Sarah came down from the Bay to visit. I was buzzing when I brought her back to our house from the airport, and was so excited to show her all of the things that had changed since her visit last spring. Sarah is a true jack of all trades, and in addition to being an incredible actor she has also moonlit as an accountant, a museum tour guide, and a gardener for a three-Michelin star, farm-to-table restaurant, among other things. So yea, sometimes I have questions for her.
Jesse and I eagerly showed her around our slightly-neglected yard and garden, eager to get some advice on how the hell to tend to earth so compacted and rocky it bent the broadfork I sourced to break it all up. When all of a sudden, I spotted it: a little poop.
Now, our backyard is no stranger to little critters: there’s a squirrel we call John Wayne who is constantly trying to assert his dominance over us, a murder of crows whom we love doing business with, and a group of raccoons who we discovered going after the food station during the shoot for Jesse’s short, their little hands raised in the air like zombies who love to eat garbage. But none of them have ever left us the gift of a long-but-little turd.
We three Michelin-rated outdoorsmen were tickled by our discovery, and eager to learn who our new guest was. So I, a gracious host, made a choice: rather than take a single second to think about which animals would be most likely to swing through our yard to take a little dump and google their scat, I would immediately pay $5 to download an app that identifies different kinds of animal poop for you, without vetting its sources or frankly thinking twice about it. It’s for Sarah, I thought. I want her to like LA!
The app’s first assessment came as a bit of a shock:
While I admit that this gave me a bit of a rush, I ultimately had to concede that the teeny little log we found was nowhere near the size of a bear doo, though the app did urge us to let “authorities” know regardless. The app probably can’t get a sense of scale, Jesse said casually, not expecting me to amend my technique. But a Michelin-star detective leaves no stone unturned:
The app urged me to study the “pile of pellets” that are a black-tailed deer’s signature, paying no attention to the one long doo I submitted, nor to the finger-for-scale which Jesse remarked “actually got pretty close.” Several submissions later, I was no closer to discovering what critter sought comfort just feet from my bed. I felt disappointed in our (my) failed mission, and silly that I impulsively bought an app rather than guess on my own that it was probably, I don’t know, a cat? But whatever, it was just five dollars.
A week later we were evacuated in San Diego. Sarah had had a wonderful time in LA, leaving just one day before the fires started, and we were safe but exhausted, frantically checking our phones to monitor the fire’s progress relative to our area. On our second day there, Jesse and I went to go see the sea lions who famously lounge on the cliffs in La Jolla. We drove down in silence and joined hundreds of tourists in watching droves of seals and sea lions flopping on top of each other on the beach, an experience akin to being at Disney World in the midst of a personal tragedy.
All of a sudden, there was a buzz from my phone: a $5 charge from the app store for my weekly subscription to Animal Scat Identifier. I hadn’t read the fine print; I couldn’t even be mad. I looked out at the cliffs, covered in tourists and seals and bird shit. At least, I thought it was bird shit. But it was cheaper just to guess.
Have a wonderful weekend my friends! The variety show I co-host, Quality Time, is coming back on February 10th at 7:15 at The Lyric Hyperion! With improv from me and Erin Keif, music from MaryLeigh Roohan, standup from Tien Tran, a presentation from Louisa Kellogg, and more! Hope to see you there if you’re in LA :) Tickets here!
Love ya!
xx Olivia