S**TTY TREASURE

If you dropped any jewelry down a drain or in a steaming pile of you know what, would you want it back or would you just call it a loss? Well, a San Rafael, California woman is singing the praises of the district's sanitation workers after they recovered a gold necklace with sentimental value to it that she'd accidentally flushed down the toilet months earlier.

Ann Aulakh said that she woke up in the middle of the night in October and accidentally flushed her Italian gold Byzantine chain that her husband gave her on their first Christmas together in 1993. Aulakh heard a splash, but thought it just came from herself (ew!) and noticed her necklace was missing the next morning. She said that she touched her neck and realized that her chain wasn't there and put two and two together, realizing what had happened.

Aulakh's hubby, Jeet, tried to retrieve the necklace with a wet vac, but was unsuccessful. Several years ago, a burglar broke into the couple's home and stole all of Aulakh's jewelry, including heirlooms from her mom, except the gold necklace, earrings, and rings she was wearing at the time. She was convinced that the gold chain was gone forever, until her neighbor called the San Rafael Sanitation Department and left a message about the missing chain.

Last month, a sanitation district employee was performing a routine cleaning of the pipeline and discovered the necklace. The sewer maintenance supervisor remembered the phone message because she asked for the district's "jewelry recovery department." He went on to say that a lot of times when jewelry is down in the sewer, it will turn black from all the sewage. (Bulp!) A necklace is one thing that you can usually spot, but rings have to really looked for.

The district called the neighbor to let her know that they'd recovered the necklace, and she planned to wrap it up in a little box and surprise her friend, but before she could, a sanitary district, maintenance worker personally dropped it off at the Aulakh residence. Ann Aulakh said that she was shocked to the necklace back and even more impressed that it was cleaned, polished, and personally delivered! She went onto say that the necklace's clasp was broken and needs to be repaired, hence the drop in the toilet, but she also said that she was happy to get it back before Valentine's Day and her 19th Wedding Anniversary next week!

Now, the question is have you ever dropped anything of value in the toilet where you had to reach in and grab it? If so, would you be wearing it? I mean, I know that it's clean now, but the thought of all the urine and fecal matter that was one it before would make me feel pretty crappy! What do you guys think? Otherwise, what a great story!