Your point about what to do with ashes is well taken. It's not as simple as one would believe; I know, I have two boxes of them, and no "instructions." I thought about leaving them in the back seat of my unlocked car in a pretty package, but I'm skeptical someone will take them. Then, because my mom loved art, I thought about trickling them out of my pocket at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, but I'm not crazy about the idea of jail. So they're destined to remain in my closet until this Boomer kicks the bucket. Just like all the other stuff I don't know what to do with.
You reminded me my husband said when he was a little boy, he put his green beans in the cuffs of his pants when his mother wasn't looking, and disposed of them outside. This technique was also used in a prison movie, with the dirt the prisoners dug out.
The movie you’re referring to may be, I believe, “The Great Escape,” which was, in my humble opinion, one of the top ten movies ever made. Stellar cast, acting, directing, script, score, dialogue you could understand because actors were still taught how to speak clearly (ahem). And I digress. Sorry.
Take and old Amazon box put the ashes in it and put it on your porch during the Christmas season. No potential jail time involved and you'll save time and money by not having to gift wrap anything!
My sibs and I “divided up” my Mom. My portion rests in a marmalade jar and sits in a big box in my closet with the boxed ashes of three cats and a dog. I dunno what to do with any of’em.
You could donate the ashes to those weird environmental groups that attack art to convince oil companies to stop making oil. They could throw the ashes onto some of the most famous paintings in the world.
(And you could probably get some sort of tax deduction for donating to a "charity")
True Story: I know a woman who couldn’t decide what to do with her father’s cremated remains. For years, she kept them in the trunk of her car. One winter day, her car got stuck on an icy patch of snow. How could she get traction? Her dad had helped her out of jams many times in his life, so she decided to let him help her out one last time.
This is indeed a problem for me, and it plays hell with my PT routine. On the other hand, because I already know this, I don't bother -- for the exercises I'm supposed to do on my back or side, I just do in bed. (Pro tip: leave the bedroom window blinds closed until post-PT.)
Dang that gravity. It’s a cross many of us have to bear. I will sometimes get up with a groan and the imprecation, “I’m not 19 anymore!” Which of course is painfully obvious to any observer. Sometimes it’s painful for me, too, but that’s another story. 😳😁
Cremation: Yep, my Irish uncle was cremated. Only problem was, they had to wait three weeks to have the funeral. It took that long for the fire to go out.
I'm also a boomer but don't fall asleep watching crime series, my wife does. The hard part is trying to tell her what happened in the bits she missed. OK, maybe I do doze off sometimes. We sometimes rewatch the series as we don't know whether we already watched it.
Consider yourself fortunate. I was just boring. At a committee meeting for planning our high school class reunion, when we were deadlocked, l said, “Look at us!” As a clique we were so freaking boring.
I think growing up without cell phones and GPS indeed makes us courageous hardy pioneers. I was recently telling my kids how I used to find my way around the city by using folded paper street maps. They looked at me as if I was describing the time I looked at a battlefield map with Gen. Ulysses Grant.
I remember when an operator connected your call. In the small town where I lived, I knew most of the operators and often had conversations with them before they did their job. I even married one of them
In Long Beach (CA) ... a relatively good sized city in the day ... you could call anyone on your party line by just dialing the last four numbers, and there was no such thing as an area code
But again, if someone was hogging that line, you couldn't do it
My mom's sister married a Canadian and went to live there. They would talk on each other's bdays and Christmas, and one of us kids would be responsible for watching the clock for when 20 minutes had elapsed, all they could afford. Long distance international. My mom had to budget for those calls.
My subconscious stereo's response to the Economist's article: "Why don't y'all just F F Fade away! Talkin' 'bout my Generation!" "People try to put us down..." What else was a generation with a solid work ethic and no clue about self care to do but party!?
Nope. Ignore me. But in my defence, I was acting so disgracefully the first 50 years of my life that I cannot remember a lot of it. Now? The Economist is probably statistically wrong. I reckon one of the writers has a mom still getting her mojo on and he’s embarrassed. In fact most of us are doing just what Dave is doing: dozing through television shows. Although to be fair, they really are not worth staying awake. And the only midnight riding we are doing is on the loo (once we decide we really do need to pee).
In response to The Economist's contention that it's time for the Boomers' party to be over: "Over? Did you say 'over'? Nothing is over until we decide it is! Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? Hell no!"
Dave, if we had ruined our bodies by behaving so disgracefully back in 'the day' you would not have been able to fake trip over the sod so successfully. Also assuming you were able to get back up, although that was not shown.
Dave, new band name idea “BOOMERS BEHAVING BADLEY”. Though I think the interest in behaving badley stems from our dissatisfaction with not having all of our TV channels like the good old days. This streaming stuff is driving me crazy in trying to figure out where the good stuff is at. Perhaps we need to reinvent TV Guide. Well that’s my old fart rant for the week.
I found this commentary on death and cremation to be seriously hilarious. Now that I'm sufficiently recovered, I have a serious question regarding red Adirondack chairs. My son informed me that if you have these in your yard, as I do, it's putting a message out that swingers live there. Is this true? And should I take them when I move to The Villages?
Oh God, something else to consider when making new friends. I never heard that, but the co-pilot search says this: Bottom line: In some areas, yes — it’s a known local code. In others, it’s just a harmless piece of furniture. If you’re curious, you can’t confirm without asking the owners, and if you’re concerned about privacy, you might consider changing the color or placement to avoid unintended signaling.
I have friends who live in the Villages. Trust me, you don’t want to move there. I hear there are still more Tr*mp bumper stickers on` golf carts than there are invites to toga parties.
My reaction to the Neptune Society letter my wife received a few days ago was, they must have a gimmick ... but just what is the gimmick? My best guess: underwater cremations.
On the survey I checked that I wanted my body cremated but on the other hand I've always loved to go bowling...
Also since I'll be already dead, maybe I could become a United States Senator.
Sorry Dennis -- you can't go bowling without a special election.
No problem I have $3.50 in my war chest!
Grassley of Iowa is only 92, so you will have a long wait for his position to open up.
I'd vote for you.
More than half US Senators are not currently cremated.
Doesn't mean I can't hope that that changes.
Good one Dennis! 😆
Your point about what to do with ashes is well taken. It's not as simple as one would believe; I know, I have two boxes of them, and no "instructions." I thought about leaving them in the back seat of my unlocked car in a pretty package, but I'm skeptical someone will take them. Then, because my mom loved art, I thought about trickling them out of my pocket at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, but I'm not crazy about the idea of jail. So they're destined to remain in my closet until this Boomer kicks the bucket. Just like all the other stuff I don't know what to do with.
You reminded me my husband said when he was a little boy, he put his green beans in the cuffs of his pants when his mother wasn't looking, and disposed of them outside. This technique was also used in a prison movie, with the dirt the prisoners dug out.
Genius husband. (Well, genius little boy, anyhow.)
The movie you’re referring to may be, I believe, “The Great Escape,” which was, in my humble opinion, one of the top ten movies ever made. Stellar cast, acting, directing, script, score, dialogue you could understand because actors were still taught how to speak clearly (ahem). And I digress. Sorry.
Take and old Amazon box put the ashes in it and put it on your porch during the Christmas season. No potential jail time involved and you'll save time and money by not having to gift wrap anything!
Better yet, put them into one of those exploding boxes that, instead of green paint, would coat a thief with sooty dead mother-in-law ashes.
Nice idea. "Remains of the Porch Snatchers" would make for a good film.
No, you put them in an Amazon box and leave them on your front porch :-)
Dave Barry might add "...and put a sign in plain sight 'No, there is no Ring camera
watching this porch'"
My sibs and I “divided up” my Mom. My portion rests in a marmalade jar and sits in a big box in my closet with the boxed ashes of three cats and a dog. I dunno what to do with any of’em.
This may be one of the dilemmas Boomers bequeath to their children.........
The Boomers have an annoying amount of things they don’t know what to do with. Maybe those things should be cremated with them!
You could donate the ashes to those weird environmental groups that attack art to convince oil companies to stop making oil. They could throw the ashes onto some of the most famous paintings in the world.
(And you could probably get some sort of tax deduction for donating to a "charity")
True Story: I know a woman who couldn’t decide what to do with her father’s cremated remains. For years, she kept them in the trunk of her car. One winter day, her car got stuck on an icy patch of snow. How could she get traction? Her dad had helped her out of jams many times in his life, so she decided to let him help her out one last time.
You KNOW Dad would have been pleased.
Yes! Shooting turkeys is all well and good, but I think most of us would rather spend our after-years providing traction for our kids.
Standard practice in Minnesota.
Yep, 10 months of every year.
Dad...helpful to the end...and beyond.
The problem with carrying around a loved one's ashes hoping they'll come in handy is you'll probably force it.
"Do we have any sunblock?"
"No, but I could rub these ashes in your..."
"For the thousandth time, no, Gary."
So was cause of second death recorded as “vehicular manslaughter” … otherwise known as being run over?
I admire your ability to fall on cue and not get hurt.
I am still on the ground.
And this is likely why you live in FL where it's never too hot or cold.
There’s a great deal of assuming going on in the second part of your comment.
Oh, he would have quipped on it had that happened.
Once the cast came off and he could type again.
But no video of him getting up. I’m always curious if everyone has as much trouble getting up from the ground as I do!
This is indeed a problem for me, and it plays hell with my PT routine. On the other hand, because I already know this, I don't bother -- for the exercises I'm supposed to do on my back or side, I just do in bed. (Pro tip: leave the bedroom window blinds closed until post-PT.)
Dang that gravity. It’s a cross many of us have to bear. I will sometimes get up with a groan and the imprecation, “I’m not 19 anymore!” Which of course is painfully obvious to any observer. Sometimes it’s painful for me, too, but that’s another story. 😳😁
Cremation: Yep, my Irish uncle was cremated. Only problem was, they had to wait three weeks to have the funeral. It took that long for the fire to go out.
I'm also a boomer but don't fall asleep watching crime series, my wife does. The hard part is trying to tell her what happened in the bits she missed. OK, maybe I do doze off sometimes. We sometimes rewatch the series as we don't know whether we already watched it.
Yep, I'm currently watching one and keep having deja vu. I'm either a sleeper or a seer.
I tend to fall asleep immediately before it's revealed who did the crime. I wake up shortly thereafter, disappointed.
I do not recall being disgraceful when I was younger. I do remember being stupid.
Consider yourself fortunate. I was just boring. At a committee meeting for planning our high school class reunion, when we were deadlocked, l said, “Look at us!” As a clique we were so freaking boring.
I think growing up without cell phones and GPS indeed makes us courageous hardy pioneers. I was recently telling my kids how I used to find my way around the city by using folded paper street maps. They looked at me as if I was describing the time I looked at a battlefield map with Gen. Ulysses Grant.
MerryCatholic.substack.com
Ah-h there's "that look" that our adult kids give us when we're writing directions.........
Using paper maps and pay phones...always had to have a pocket full of change somewhere.
Pay phones. How many kids today would have a clue as to what was going on in Jim Croce's "Operator."
I remember when an operator connected your call. In the small town where I lived, I knew most of the operators and often had conversations with them before they did their job. I even married one of them
My sweet memory of being connected by an operator is my teenage son calling me in CA from Fiji collect on Christmas. Best $100 phone call!
Same for me - assuming one of the other 8 persons on our party line wasn't hogging it.
In Long Beach (CA) ... a relatively good sized city in the day ... you could call anyone on your party line by just dialing the last four numbers, and there was no such thing as an area code
But again, if someone was hogging that line, you couldn't do it
Michael, I have a proposal -- Ask 10 children and 10 teens to explain this Croce song; and let us know :-)
My mom's sister married a Canadian and went to live there. They would talk on each other's bdays and Christmas, and one of us kids would be responsible for watching the clock for when 20 minutes had elapsed, all they could afford. Long distance international. My mom had to budget for those calls.
Not sure if it's worth the trip to the bathroom? Depends!
🎶🎶 “Puh-puh-puh Prissy and the Twits,” I hear Elton John singing in my head.
Thanks for reinvigorating an incredibly annoying ear worm from decades past ...
Why should I suffer alone? 😁
My subconscious stereo's response to the Economist's article: "Why don't y'all just F F Fade away! Talkin' 'bout my Generation!" "People try to put us down..." What else was a generation with a solid work ethic and no clue about self care to do but party!?
I thought that was McCartney’s post-Beatles band Wings?
Nope. Ignore me. But in my defence, I was acting so disgracefully the first 50 years of my life that I cannot remember a lot of it. Now? The Economist is probably statistically wrong. I reckon one of the writers has a mom still getting her mojo on and he’s embarrassed. In fact most of us are doing just what Dave is doing: dozing through television shows. Although to be fair, they really are not worth staying awake. And the only midnight riding we are doing is on the loo (once we decide we really do need to pee).
In response to The Economist's contention that it's time for the Boomers' party to be over: "Over? Did you say 'over'? Nothing is over until we decide it is! Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? Hell no!"
"Germans?" "Forget it, he's on a roll."
Shh. He’s on a roll.
Dave, if we had ruined our bodies by behaving so disgracefully back in 'the day' you would not have been able to fake trip over the sod so successfully. Also assuming you were able to get back up, although that was not shown.
He might still be laying there.
Dave, new band name idea “BOOMERS BEHAVING BADLEY”. Though I think the interest in behaving badley stems from our dissatisfaction with not having all of our TV channels like the good old days. This streaming stuff is driving me crazy in trying to figure out where the good stuff is at. Perhaps we need to reinvent TV Guide. Well that’s my old fart rant for the week.
I'd travel to see a band with this name :-)
Is there some meaning to the word “badley?” My autocorrect won’t even print it.
Maybe it's Boomers Behaving Baldly. That would fit a lot of the Boomers of my acquaintance.
MLP will likely suggest correction.
Dave Barry is a national treasure.
I found this commentary on death and cremation to be seriously hilarious. Now that I'm sufficiently recovered, I have a serious question regarding red Adirondack chairs. My son informed me that if you have these in your yard, as I do, it's putting a message out that swingers live there. Is this true? And should I take them when I move to The Villages?
Oh God, something else to consider when making new friends. I never heard that, but the co-pilot search says this: Bottom line: In some areas, yes — it’s a known local code. In others, it’s just a harmless piece of furniture. If you’re curious, you can’t confirm without asking the owners, and if you’re concerned about privacy, you might consider changing the color or placement to avoid unintended signaling.
That's what I get for watching Sullivan's Crossing and liking those red chairs! Thanks for the info.
What it really means is the attending nurse can sit you there and know you won't escape.
This is true. Having them and using them are very different. It takes a Village. 😂
I have friends who live in the Villages. Trust me, you don’t want to move there. I hear there are still more Tr*mp bumper stickers on` golf carts than there are invites to toga parties.
My reaction to the Neptune Society letter my wife received a few days ago was, they must have a gimmick ... but just what is the gimmick? My best guess: underwater cremations.
Incorporating the cremains into a submarine's torpedo that can be used to hunt large fish?
my dad was aboard submarines in WWII. The Navy took his ashes to sea. We asked about the Torpedo option; you should of seen the stares we got.