Posted by Charles Cowling
Coming soon, A Giving Tribute — ‘the caring alternative to funeral flowers’ — a project I wholeheartedly endorse.
Over in Canada, “Cartoonist Adrian Raeside once placed an obituary in the Times Colonist in which he asked mourners to send singlemalt scotch and Cuban cigars in lieu of flowers.” [Source]
What’s your alternative to funeral flowers?
Posted by Charles Cowling
I HAVE wonderful friends … one, from Texas, put a hand on my thinning shoulder, and appeared to study the ground where we were standing. He had flown in to see me.
“We need to go buy you a pistol, don’t we?” he asked quietly. He meant to shoot myself with.
In addition to wonderful friends, New York Times journalist Dudley Clendinen has ALS, commonly called Motor Neurone Disease in the UK. In a very powerful piece he describes what he’s going to do about it.
There is no meaningful treatment. No cure. There is one medication, Rilutek, which might make a few months’ difference. It retails for about $14,000 a year. That doesn’t seem worthwhile to me. If I let this run the whole course, with all the human, medical, technological and loving support I will start to need just months from now, it will leave me, in 5 or 8 or 12 or more years, a conscious but motionless, mute, withered, incontinent mummy of my former self. Maintained by feeding and waste tubes, breathing and suctioning machines.
No, thank you. I hate being a drag.
I think it’s important to say that. We obsess in this country about how to eat and dress and drink, about finding a job and a mate. About having sex and children. About how to live. But we don’t talk about how to die. We act as if facing death weren’t one of life’s greatest, most absorbing thrills and challenges. Believe me, it is. This is not dull. But we have to be able to see doctors and machines, medical and insurance systems, family and friends and religions as informative — not governing — in order to be free.
He’s not going to do anything to prolong his life: “Lingering would be a colossal waste of love and money.”
Read the whole beautifully thought, beautifully written piece here.
Posted by Charles Cowling
What is the well dressed corpse wearing? Clothes which co-decompose: http://bit.ly/jOJlxm
Aussie undertakers strategise for the future. Better experience, better service. Full marks. http://bit.ly/m8t88b
Music therapy for the dying. Touching. http://nyti.ms/mzIjDW
Queenslanders urged to employ industry regulator to weed out “rouge [sic] or ‘cowboy’ operators.” http://bit.ly/leMNWF
From the US: “for-profit health chains are cynically exploiting this model to fill their own pockets.” Beware, UK! http://nyti.ms/lr4CW3
Check out Dignity’s projected price increase for funerals in the UK. Complete cobblers? http://tgr.ph/mJOZeo
Exploding funeral pyre injures 20 – http://bit.ly/jcDxnx
MakingAnExit Sarah Murray RT by GoodFunerals
When I’m dead and “green” – a look at the options for a more environmentally friendly exit: bit.ly/qnDsR1
Spend some time in the mind of an old-school undertaker. It may creep you out – http://tinyurl.com/6khd6ns
‘Abuse of a corpse.’ There’s such a ring to that. Could you be done for this in the UK? http://bit.ly/rgZ1dK
Germans are being cremated in Holland – cheaper + more respectful. Great piece here: http://bit.ly/pomDrH
Deer wake up and smell the roses at Salisbury crem –http://bit.ly/nTh0Tj
Graphic pics of drug wars on the Mexico-US border –http://bit.ly/p3GKO9
‘The scraped were condemned to topical infirmary with non-life threatening injuries’ – http://bit.ly/oc2YiS
What use funerals when people say things like “The loss is incalculable. It will not kick in until after the funeral”?http://bit.ly/pCKHR9
GoodFunerals Charles Cowling
Corpse makeup the next big thing, say fashionistas. http://bit.ly/nKg1FL
C of E dead set on raising minister fee to £150. Great news for secular celebrants – http://reut.rs/n1ziPK
The priciest funeral homes in Vermont are owned by… SCI, surprise surprise. These corps are so crap – http://bit.ly/puahxc
Natural burial ground ran out of money, dammit! http://bit.ly/q1c9MbWill sustainability issues soon haunt others?
Spice up your sex life: do it in a funeral home – http://bit.ly/nOygTU
Celebration of life planned for dead elm – http://bit.ly/qdyYN1
Bristol council publishes zombie attack contingency plan –http://bit.ly/iw3EAL
You’ve got to feel sorry for these people. 1st the vile Co-op buys their crem, now it wants to close down their post office http://bit.ly/rdk48J
More on bespoke deathwear which co-decomposes –http://ind.pn/od4Bzc
Boomers, a stuffed bear and the hyper-personalised funeral –http://bit.ly/nann4A
Oh dear, the C of E has thrown out the proposed fee increase for funerals – http://tgr.ph/rlxsLB
Taiwan funeral strippers, lower gods and the heat and noise factor –http://on.io9.com/qNyC5l
