Results tagged “death” from The official blog of Vat19.com

If your marriage didn't last "until death do us part", what do you do with your wedding ring that you won't be wearing anymore? Throw it in a drawer? Keep it in a memory box? Pawn it?

Another option is to give that useless wedding ring a proper farewell and bury it in a Wedding Ring Coffin. For $24.95 the coffin comes with a standard phrase on a plaque (for example, "Six feet isn't deep enough" or "Gone and Forgotten"), or for $34.95 you can customize your own plaque. I can only imaging what these divorcees want written. I'd love to know the craziest request they've received.

As horror movies become more and more inventive with the ways they kill off their actors, it’s interesting to see how real life matches up in terms of gruesome deaths. Here are some interesting worldwide annual statistics based on data compiled in January 2004.

• Contact with a powered lawnmower – 51 deaths


• Varicose veins in the lower extremities - 1001 deaths


• Bitten by rat - 5 deaths


• Assault by pushing or placing someone before a moving object - 110 deaths. Clearly, this is the result of too many silent films with people tied to train tracks.


• Contact with hot tap water - 337 deaths


• Drowning in the bathtub - 4010 deaths, mostly in Japan. Why?


• Ignition or melting of nightwear - 85 deaths

You can read the entire list of causes at NationMaster. You’ll either be relieved (that you’re probably not going to die of being bitten by a rat) or terrified at all the new possibilities you had never considered.

We’re not really sure why, but it seems like there’s a growing movement to put the “fun” back in funerals. Ceremonies themselves are becoming increasingly casual, and people are coming up with more creative ways to commemorate the lives of their loved ones.

Music executive Alexander Bernard Harris was celebrated with a bizarre visitation where he was viewed in his yellow Lamborghini. The recent movie “Undertaking Betty” featured Christopher Walken as a crazy Irish funeral director with a love for the extravagant. His funerals included Spock ears, levitating coffins, and musical theatre.

The most disturbing display that we’ve seen, though, is Ashes to Portraits. Instead of just leaving ashes to lie around gathering dust (can ashes gather dust??), their artist combines the cremains with oil paint to create new works of art. We agree that it can be a positive way to grieve and remember a loved one, and we agree that it’s harmless, but we can’t help feeling like it’s still very, very creepy.