Thursday, August 20, 2009

Another mystery totally solved.

If you read back through past entries you will come across a large number of homemade finger bandages we found bloodied in the grass every morning. Guess what? They weren't finger bandages at all, but leg bandages for a tiny Chihuahua that a pudgy man lovingly carried through the neighborhood in the wee morning hours. It was kind of him to discard them on our street every day, and give us a mystery to make life fun.
(Guest post by Andrew)

Mystery not-so solved


After nearly a year of wondering who in their not-at-all right mind was dumping their slops into this little cleared circle near our house, I have finally caught them in the act! I always pictured them creeping out in the pre-dawn hours to dump, but I saw an old woman out there around noon, tossing god-knows-what around. But wait, a few days later I saw a different woman brazenly sloshing the nastiness pictured above out of a bucket. There have been a lot of gross finds in the Offering Circle (hereby shortened to the OC), but this one in particular just turned my stomach. Perhaps it was how fresh it all was, or the combination of ingredients: noodles, chocolate eclairs, tortilla chips, wheat buns, unidentifiable bits, or the copious liquid I saw pouring out of the bucket that no picture can capture.

I really want to ask them the obvious "why?", but I already know they'll just say they're feeding the birds. And then I'll have to point out that birds don't normally eat chocolate eclairs, bone chunks, tortilla chips, fettuccine alfredo, etc, etc the list goes on and on. My new mission is to capture one or both of these ladies on camera for you, gentle reader. Neither lady is particularly remarkable, but if you're like us, you feel like you already know them. Or at least what they've been eating recently.
(Guest posted by Andrew)

Recycling: Fail


I am constantly surprised by how many scenes of discarded clothing we come across in Los Angeles. This pile of unfashionable and moist-looking (didn't touch to confirm dew content) ladystuffs was mere feet from the well-known Offering Circle. Now it's one-stop shopping for sloppy leftover food and padded bras. The previous owner left this mess next to their recycling bin, and I picture them hauling it out to dump into the bin, but then wondering if clothes were even recyclable. Then they realized that there was someone out there, poor and busty, who was in dire need of a bra. Perhaps take the clothes to goodwill (two blocks away) and drop them off? Nah, fuck it, here'll do fine. I would feel a lot better about the large amount of discarded clothing we find if I saw a lot more crazy naked people. Actually, no I wouldn't. (Guest post by Andrew)

Teeth! TEEEEEEEEEETH!!!



The subject line above is what immediately screamed in my head as I perused this pile of discarded clothing while waiting for the bus downtown. There is a lot of cast off clothing here, but then the owner (or angry non-owner) decided to leave a little bit more behind, and extracted two teeth and left them there. Apparently the tooth fairy does not visit the corner of Wilshire and Lucas. This is not only one of the grossest finds this blog has ever come across, but one of the most disturbing as well, especially since these pictures were taken at about four in the afternoon. I don't expect the streets of L.A. to be sparkling, but I would like them sans bloody teeth, if possible. (Guest post by Andrew)

The remains of the day.



At first glance this appears to be the usual mouth-watering assortment of food tidbits that are usually found in the offering circle. Upon closer inspection, however, this offering is unique in that it contains big chunks of bone. In the top picture you can see what appears to be a neck stump toward the bottom, and in the lower picture you can see pieces of what I really hope is not (but is very most likely) spine. Do you know what birds love? Flesh. The bottom picture was taken about five minutes before the top picture. The birds could not get enough of this meaty miasma. I had a strong urge to bag the neck stump and take it to a police station for I.D, but I figured if it were human, it was likely a Fried Green Tomatoes situation and everything had worked itself out. (Guest posted by Andrew)