Coffin Talk

[TL]

I also like what the Parsis do with their dead.

Care to enlighten?

[Chris L]

This is old news, but still:


Manager Fred Elsner, the friendly face of shopping for a coffin

Low-cost coffins hit Costco
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/3991921.stm

I don't envy that guy.  When the time comes to shop for your coffin it should be a meaningful, poignant experience, but for him it'll probably seem like just another day at the store.


A keen understanding of human nature; that's what I bring to all my posts.  

[Dorvid Barnas]

Cremation is cheaper and better for the planet.  Shopping for a coffin should shop for a coffin.

That's not true. In the UK 16% of mercury emissions into the atmosphere are caused by cremation, its a lower percentage in the US where cremations are less common. All cremations really do is save space and deprive angsty teenagers of places to hang out.
Resomation is a green alternative to cremation.
http://www.resomation.com/

Huh.  I didn't know I had that much mercury in me!
I stand corrected. 

[Stan]

And now everything comes full circle to Hearse chat:

http://www.coffin-talk.net/viewtopic.php?t=1837&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0

Let's resurrect hearse chat!

If you want to relive the thrill of me fighting on the internet with a fourteen year old and his mother then here you go:

http://www.friendsoftom.com/board/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl?board=fotboard;action=display;num=1055389272

 Good times.

[Sarah]

I also like what the Parsis do with their dead.

Care to enlighten?

There's a lot of ritual crapola, but what I like about the setup is that, to quote Wikipedia, "the bodies of the dead are placed atop a tower—a tower of silence—and so exposed to the sun and to birds of prey."  Neat, efficient, and nutritious.

[Sarah]

If you want to relive the thrill of me fighting on the internet with a fourteen year old and his mother then here you go:

http://www.friendsoftom.com/board/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl?board=fotboard;action=display;num=1055389272

 Good times.

Boy, you were an old fart in those days, weren't you, Stan o' mine?  Indeed, the whole board was more of an old fart back then.  I would have been banned in no time, I so easily veer off topic.

[moonshake]

There's a lot of ritual crapola, but what I like about the setup is that, to quote Wikipedia, "the bodies of the dead are placed atop a tower—a tower of silence—and so exposed to the sun and to birds of prey."  Neat, efficient, and nutritious.

What I like about the Tibetan Sky Funeral is...

On the day of the funeral, a sky-funeral master arrives to carry the deceased body up to the burial ground, with friends and a lama following closely behind. The master rips open the body of the deceased, then calls for the vultures to devour it. The skeleton is hammered into pieces as finely as possible for the vultures to eat. Sometimes flour is added at the end to mix the bone with the flesh. At a good sky funeral the whole body (including the bones) are eaten by the vultures. This means that the deceased was a pure person. The skull is kept at the site.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibetan_people#Life_cycles

[Sarah]

Much more labor-intensive.

[John Junk 2.0]

Cremation is cheaper and better for the planet.  Shopping for a coffin should shop for a coffin.

That's not true. In the UK 16% of mercury emissions into the atmosphere are caused by cremation, its a lower percentage in the US where cremations are less common. All cremations really do is save space and deprive angsty teenagers of places to hang out.
Resomation is a green alternative to cremation.
http://www.resomation.com/

I'd actually consider being resomated if the process had a better-looking website.

At present, little compares to the glamor and flash of the process of plastination:
http://www.bodyworlds.com/en/plastination/plastination_process.html

***Hey, that trip down message board memory lane reminded me how strict it used to be!  Like AST or something!  Chris and Gord ran a tight ship back then, I tell you.  No wonder I got all fogey-time when Fotchan first appeared!--But that exchange seemed stilted and weird.  Has it been edited a lot or something??

[Fido]

An interesting message arrived in my email inbox yesterday, entitled "The Most Common Mistakes When Writing Your Will." 

Foremost among these mistakes, it went on to suggest, is not having a will in the first place.  The implication is that you'd better start writing your will, and that reminded me of shopping for a coffin.  If you're already tired of hearing that so-and-so better start shopping for a coffin, you can always state that he or she better start writing a will. 

[Stan]

***Hey, that trip down message board memory lane reminded me how strict it used to be!  Like AST or something!  Chris and Gord ran a tight ship back then, I tell you.  No wonder I got all fogey-time when Fotchan first appeared!--But that exchange seemed stilted and weird.  Has it been edited a lot or something??

 As the old fogey in that exchange, I remember there being a lot more but bear in mind there was an administrator at the time who carried the nickname 'Petey Deletey'. Also things weren't all that strict about off topic stuff, the problem was the fourteen year olds were using the place like a chat room which, on a single board proved disasterous.

 All in all, I'm still glad I was mean to that kid and his mom.

[yaysarcasm]

You know who should have went shopping for a coffin last week?

Charlton Heston.

[TremblingEagle]

You know who should have went shopping for a coffin last week?

Charlton Heston.

too soon

[Martin]

*insert cold dead hands joke*

[masterofsparks]

Skybus went shopping for a coffin, too.