A great and indispensable guide book for home funeralists
Great excitement here at GFG HQ. The latest edition of the Resource Guide – a Manual for Home Funeral Care has just arrived from Beth Knox at Crossings: Caring For Our Own at Death. Is it the very first copy to set foot on UK soil? I rather fancy it is. In the UK, as […]
The time has come to give celebrants their due
The business model of most busy undertakers subordinates the needs of consumers to the necessity to get things done—paperwork, prepping bodies (laying them out and dressing them), transport issues. The interests of the business and the interests of you, the consumer, conflict. In balancing, on the one hand, things to do against, on the other, […]
Dad buries dead son in back garden
There’s a tragic story doing the rounds of the papers concerning a lad in Scotland whose father buried him in the garden of his ex-council semi. Robert Milloy, known to all as Boab, (18) was hit by a train as he walked across a level crossing near his home. His father, Robert, is quoted as […]
Whose funeral is it anyway?
If you want to open a cattery in the UK you need a licence. Cat care is regulated. If you want to open a funeral home you need nothing of the sort, no exams, no professional qualifications, no previous experience—nothing. Anyone can do it, scoundrels, incompetents, sex-workers, school leavers, sociopaths, stand-up comics. The care of […]
All shades of green in the green shade
Progressive movements in the world of funerals mostly march resolutely forwards into the past. The past is that place where they did things properly, the place we need to return to if we are to reclaim the care of our dead and the rituals of their passing; the place we must to return to if […]
Funeralcare screwupdate
I’ve blogged about Co-op Funeralcare screwups in the past. I have been critical and it has unsettled people. We all screw up sometimes; to err is human. Be a little kinder, people have said (cos remember, you screw up sometimes, too, yes?) Of course. And I hope I come out with my hands up. But […]
The dead belong to their people
In the United States, Thomas Lynch, sage, poet, writer and undertaker, has been denounced by industry watchdogs the Funeral Consumers Alliance (FCA) and the Funeral Ethics Organization (FEO). Both of these organisations exist to protect consumers, expose malpractice, shame shysters and explore ways in which funerals can be cheaper and more meaningful. Both organisations are […]
The world of death has given birth to very few websites of any value or beauty. Most undertakers are technodunces; many do not even rise to email.What’s more, there is very little discussion of death and dying going on in this country (the UK) just now. I have far more responses to this blog from […]
Habeas corpus
I was emailed last night by someone who wants to visit their dead parent at the undertaker’s. The undertaker won’t make an appointment. The client thinks the undertaker is prevaricating. The undertaker tells the client that the customary time to visit a dead person is the day before the funeral. This is not soon enough […]
Evansabove
In December 2006, Boyd Evans, 20, a talented, stylish, popular hairdresser, died after a car crash along with his partner, Nathan. Boyd’s mother, Teresa, set about trying to get his clothes and things back: “I had wanted every last thing close to Boyd in his last moments.” The hospital prevaricated, then told her they […]
