Love the wrought iron detail on this one . . . and if the stamp on the side is to be believed, it dates from 1887.
So as I'm cleaning the underside, I feel something stuck to one leg. I take a peek: it's brown and oval-shaped. A spider egg from those months in the garage? Nope, couldn't be . . . it's way too hard.
I try to pry it off with my fingers. And that's when I realize . . . what does every kid sneak in school? And where does every kid plaster it when the teacher catches them with it?
That's right: GUM. Calcified, fossilized, 100+ year-old chewing gum. Eewwwwww.
I rushed inside to Purell my hands. Hopefully whatever living organisms that gum harbored died a long, long time ago.
Happily, though, the bench turned out cute:
