Man receives hotel pardon 17 years after wrecking room with pepperoni-flavored seagull shit

It’s always nice when the viral stories we consume every day can have some kind of happy ending or closure. The fun puppy gets adopted, or the weird yodeling child is finally hurled into the volcano, appeasing the vengeful gods. Now, one of the more amusing online stories of the last few months has reached its completion, and we’re happy—courtesy of The New York Times, no less—to report that the pepperoni-seagull-shit guy has formally received his pardon from the Fairmont Empress in Victoria, British Columbia.

For those who didn’t see the story back in early March, you can read the full post down below. In short, though: 17 years ago, a guy named Nick Burchill accidentally left the windows of his room at the hotel open, at the same time he was transporting a suitcase full of pepperoni for some friends. Given that the hotel is located close to the sea, nature took its horrible, inevitable, unpleasantly sticky course, and Burchill received a life-time ban from the hotel for his unintended redecoration of the room in themes of “seagull excrement, pepperoni chunks, and drool,” a ban he has just recently attempted to appeal. The post itself, understandably, went viral.

Thankfully, the hotel’s current managers are apparently a forgiving lot: According to the Times, the ban has now been lifted, as long as Burchill promises to leave his delicious, bird-enticing cured meats at home. Because they are human beings, the hotel’s staff apparently found the whole story very amusing (and the free advertisements for their hospitality and, uh, local wildlife probably didn’t hurt).