You guys! This happened:

Yes, that’s Dr. Oz, Cameron Diaz and a display of seven shapes of poop. I picked the best day to be sick.

Diaz was on Dr. Oz’s show to promote her book, The Body Book. Since she is a Hollywood actress, Diaz is required by California law to write a book about her health routine. She appeared on Dr. Oz to go over four simple changes to make today to have a better body tomorrow. They are:

• First thing in the morning, Diaz brushes her teeth and chugs about a liter of water
• This wakes up her digestive system and helps her poo in the morning (this is where Dr. Oz high-fives her for being open about discussing pooping. Then he unveils the seven poo shapes. It’s a scale from One to Diarrhea. You want a Number 4, by the way.  It should not make a plunk sound; rather it should slip into the bowl like “an Olympic diver going into the water”, says Oz. But I should specify you want Greg Louganis’s usual gold winning dives and not the one where he hit his head on the diving board. That means you need more fiber.)
• She exercises as she gets dressed. She explains that this is her way of making everyday routines into physical activities. I can’t wait to burn calories by shaking that cereal box every morning!
• Finally, she says to “feed your hunger. Not fear it.” I fear I’m feeding it too much but OK.

After Cameron Diaz and the Seven Stages Of Excrement segment, Dr. Oz talks about a new sugar alternative, coconut palm sugar. This leads to the most important thing I learned during Wednesday’s sick day TV watching:

Dr. Oz loves illustrative props.

He had balls on giant rubber bands to show dips in blood sugar. During a segment on macha tea, he and the guest did a routine where both tried to walk through a door at the same time (something about fat not being passed through the body). Then Oz and the Assistant Of the Day rode scooters through a “blood vessel” that got increasingly clogged each time they tried to pass through.

Let’s take a minute to talk about the Assistant Of the Day. A “lucky” audience member is chosen at random. This person jumps up, screams and runs down to hug Oz. She even squeals when asked to put on the purple gloves even though she knows she will have to touch a human organ of some kind. This is an honor apparently.

Oh man, I almost forgot about the ultimate audience participation from this episode: Oz told them to use clay to shape into their last poo. AND THEY DID. Some were even excited to share it on camera.

Seriously. This wasn’t a cold medicine induced hallucination. It really happened.