From reader John: a rotten, cling-wrapped Twinkie (a "scientific and historical curiosity") is yours for the bidding, starting at $25, less shipping.

Condition: New: A brand-new, unused, unopened, undamaged item. See the seller's listing for full details

Up for sale today is one (1) semiunwrapped authentic Hostess Twinkie, rotten as hell.

The Twinkie is in a condition of being both wrapped (in cling film) and unwrapped (out of its original packaging). Unfortunately, eBay does not allow for such niceties of distinction in its Conditions dropdown options. From the listing:

Easiest way to do this is to explain my story. I have impluse control issues, and one of them concerns (concerned) Twinkies. To put it bluntly, I love them. Like a dog, I eat them (ate) until I got sick.

So, my wife rarely buys a box for me because she knows what will happen.

Well, last year she took pity on me one movie night, and brought home a box of the creamy goodness in addition to something out of redbox. We pop the corn, dim the lights, and I bust into my box. I inhale the first one, and crack open the second one while watching the movie. Something catches my attention out of the corner of my eye. Inches from my mouth, I actually stop to look at the golden wonder for a second. It is GREEN. Not yellow, green. I turn the lights on to make sure my eyes aren't playing a trick on me.

They aren't. That sumbitch is GREEN. With streaks. My mouth starts tingling. I don't feel so well.

So, I survived, but I wrapped the green twinkie in clingwrap, and then decided I'd write Hostess. Obviously, they wanted it but I said no. They sent me a few weeks later a letter saying hey, guess what. It's not kryptonite, and surprise, they do go bad. Then, they gave me two coupons for free boxes of twinkies.

It was suggested I toss the Twinkie, but I was fascinated. So, like a biology experiment, I've kept it in my completely environmentally controlled top of my refrigerator, where I occasionally check on it to see what it's gonna morph into.

It will morph into a rotten Twinkie. Like all things, it will decay and disintegrate into nothing. You can also perform this experiment at home by selecting any dessert of your choice and exposing it to time and the elements; you can do this for free.