More Information About Whale Vomit Than You Ever Thought You Needed

Found on aol.com:

MONTAUK, N.Y. (Dec. 18) — In this season of strange presents from relatives, Dorothy Ferreira got a doozy the other day from her 82-year-old sister in Waterloo, Iowa. It was ugly. It weighed four pounds. There was no receipt in the box.

Inside she found what looked like a gnarled, funky candle but could actually be a huge hunk of petrified whale vomit worth as much as $18,000.

“I called my sister and asked her, ‘What the heck did you send me?’ ” recalled Ms. Ferreira, 67, who has lived here on the eastern tip of Long Island since 1982. “She said: ‘I don’t know, but I found it on the beach in Montauk 50 years ago and just kept it around. You’re the one who lives by the ocean; ask someone out there what it is.’ ”

Childless and never married, Ms. Ferreira bounced from job to job, most recently as a short-order cook at a local deli, and now lives on her Social Security income.

“If it really does have value, I’m not silly, of course I’d want to sell it,” Ms. Ferreira said as she looked out past her lace curtains and picket fence at the whitecaps on the bay. “This could be my retirement.”

After researching ambergris on the Internet, Ms. Ferreira’s neighbor, Joe Luiksic, advised, “Put it on eBay.” But endangered species legislation has made buying or selling the stuff illegal since the 1970s; a couple who found a large lump of ambergris valued at almost $300,000 on an Australian beach in January has had legal problems selling it.

As we enter this yuletide season, (can we still call it “Yuletide” or will that offend someone??) it’s good to read inspirational holiday stories such as this one.

Why go out shopping for expensive and unnecessary items for your loved ones when you can just give them shit you got laying around the house? And not just used DVDs or Kyle’s old stuffed animals – we’re talking about the strange and grotesque.

The lady gave her sister WHALE VOMIT.

I got some boogers underneath my sofa that I might scrape off and give to Ryan for a gift. Who knows? It might be worth some cash to the right parties.

Or do I have to save the petrified snot rockets for FIFTY years and bring them with me from home to home as I relocate for the items to increase in value? Do I have make a whale vomit pilgrimage from Long Island to IOWA to earn me some ducats?

Then, even if you hit the whale vomit goldmine, you might risk jail time in order to sell the stuff. So, as a good rule of thumb, don’t sell anything you find along the seashore, people (expect discarded syringes – sell them to your local junkie).

And the moment you were waiting for – the picture of the whale vomit:


In case we forget, Happy Christmas and Merry Hanukkah from the staff of wojr.com!

wojr

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