The order is rapidly fadin’
Blog reader Kathryn Edwards has drawn our attention to an interesting article in the Guardian. Thanks, Kathryn. In it, Rosanna Greenstreet tells how her aunt Molly donated her body for medical education or research, thereby denying everyone the benefit of a funeral. Greenstreet tells us what family and friends did instead: Molly didn’t believe in […]
Can you help?
Space burial is about sending a portion of cremation ashes into space, then releasing them so that they can orbit the Earth. Up in Glasgow, Tom Walkinshaw is developing his own space burial programme. It’s ambitious stuff. He’s won an award from Glasgow Caledonian University and he has the support of the Prince’s Scottish Youth […]
You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows
Some advice today for aspirant funeral directors from the award-winning marketing team here at the GFG-Batesville Tower. If you want to set up as a funeral director, don’t go down the cul de sac of trad undertaking. 1) There are already too many undertakers competing for too few dead people. 2) The future’s not that way […]
No yolk
A funeral director has been asked by a family to find a number of egg timers for the ashes of one of his clients. He can’t find any and has asked us if we can help. Sadly, we can’t. But can you? If you can, please drop us an email: charlescowling@blueyonder.co.uk
A Viking funeral for ashes
Over at Scattering Ashes, here, Rich has been trialling his prototype Viking longship for the fiery water burial of cremains. What do you think?
Feed Me To The Wind
Don’t pay any attention to the photo above. If you missed Feed Me To The Wind, a very good programme about ashes on R4 this morning, don’t despair; you can listen to it on the BBC website. Here’s the Beeb blurb: Tens of thousands of ashes remain uncollected or unscattered. Amanda Mitchison looks at the […]
Scattering the ashes
Posted by Vale “And when did you last see your father? Was it when they burned the coffin? Put the lid on? When he exhaled his last breath? When he sat up and said something? When he last recognized you? When he last smiled? When did you last see your father? The last time he […]
Publishing event of the year!
The Natural Death Handbook, Fifth Edition A thoroughly updated and revised edition of the Natural Death Centre‘s celebrated handbook. Now presented alongside a new collection of essays on death, dying and funeral practices by doctors, historians, authors, poets, theologians and artists including Richard Barnett, David Jay Brown, Dr Sheila Cassidy, Charles Cowling, Bill Drummond, Stephen Grasso, […]
A Viking funeral for ashes
We sometimes have good ideas here at the GFG, but we rarely make them happen. In life there are starters and there are finishers. We have little of the latter about us. One of our better ideas was a model Viking longship for launching ashes in. We urged this on our good friend Richard Martin […]
Quote of the day
“The burnt ashes are put into a cremulator that grinds them fine and grinds the bits. Some funeral homes prefer not to grind all the bits out, so that you can see it’s the remains. It’s a bit like peanut butter. Some prefer chunky. Some prefer smooth.” From an online Q and A with an American […]
