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The cometary globule CG12 and its embedded star cluster NGC 5367, taken using a 50-cm Chilescope telescope. Credit: Sebastian Voltmer
A great but peculiar example of these is Cometary Globule 12, or CG 12, which is about 2,200 light years from Earth. At first glance it's a classic of the genre, a kinda-sorta spherical glob loaded with a couple of hundred times the mass of the Sun's worth of gas and dust, and a long tail stretching away for several light years. It's creating stars inside it, and they form a cluster called NGC 5367.
But when you dig a little, you start finding weird stuff about it.