In some cultures, getting pooped on by a bird is considered good luck.

A green one, with a white patina on the left.

In France, I'm told, accidentally stepping in dog poo with your left foot is good luck, while doing the same with your right foot is bad luck.

A small brown one, with some wobble and discoloration in the middle.

I suppose that in some sense this is a worthwhile tradition, since it encourages people to look where they're going. But in both cases, these superstitions seem like the results of people merely trying to make the best out of bad situations.

An orange one, with a chunk out of it. But it's partially healed.

We can't stop birds from dropping a wet one on us from time to time, and sometimes we're going to step in crap, so we might as well make a game out of it!

A red one, with a brown blob squeezing out.

One might say that we're doing the same thing here. Defects happen, so we might as well try to make it fun! But that is not the intent.

Here, the hope is that we might appreciate some inherent qualities of the oddballs. There's nothing inherently lucky about stepping in fecal matter with your left foot, or getting shat upon by a pigeon, so those customs feel hollow.

But there is inherent beauty to be found in defects, I think — look for yourself:

A double blue one, with various blemishes.
A yellow one, with blue speckles of dye.
An orange one, with a faceted jewel-like appearance.