I don't know what this thing is actually called. Googling for "hairy clam" or "bearded clam" only brings up things I can't click on at work, and a "spiny clam" has a few really long thick spikes, not a covering of fine quasi-hair, like this guy. "Furry clam", "Fuzzy clam", "Hirsute Clam"... all turn up nothing but crotch shots on Google image search. Any malacologists out there? (Do I dare bother the great and powerful PZ Myers ?)

Our friend, Summer, found this on the beach at Topsail Island, NC, a fwe months ago. I carried it back to the condo and forgot to give it back. And now it's mine. Mine all mine.

That little blob of white on the bottom is modeling clay - excellent stuff for holding small things in place while you photograph them.

It's probably a totally common shell, but not being shell collectors, none of us had ever seen one before.

I shall call it the Hairy Clam.

Or maybe it's some kind of cockle. "Hairy Cockle" works too.