Life in the Garden

Matters of Life and Death

mental health

Don’t Touch The Service Monkey

service monkey

You know I want one.

While some folks get memos at work like this; at the pt job, we’ve been getting memos on “service monkeys”. The gist of the WORD is “NO monkeys in the house, AND if a situation ensues, call security.”

And if you travel with your monkey: From the TSA web-site:

  • Since service monkeys may likely draw attention, the handler will be escorted to the physical inspection area where a table is available for the monkey to sit on. Only the handler will touch or interact with the service monkey.
  • Security Officers have been trained to not touch the service monkey during the screening process.

Earlier coverage of emotional service animals: May 14, 2006 (airlines grapple with demands to seat large dogs and emotional-support goats)

The Softer Side of Sears

For Funeral Directors that worry about competition from Costco, internet retailers, and maybe even Wal-Mart. Remember, it’s all been done before.

Vintage Sears Catalog:

vintage sears funeral advertising

At the turn of the 19th century, budding retailers Richard Warren Sears and Alvah Curtis Roebuck breathed new life into a stagnant funeral industry by introducing mail order funeral products. Before this time, extravagant monuments, gravestones and similar goods were only afforded to the affluent and wealthy.

But they had a plan. Since their regular merchandise catalog was growing in popularity, they wanted to expand into a market that everyday working people would need. Sears, Roebuck & Co started selling marble tombstones, monuments, tablets and markers at half the cost of traditional funeral parlors and monument makers.

Sears tombstone

At its inception, Sears’ “Monuments & Tombstones” catalog offered markers starting at $4.88 and tombstones at $7.40, making them extremely affordable. The products were manufactured and shipped from Vermont in about four to six weeks.

What’s amazing about these funeral products is the craftsmanship. Though these were obviously designed by hand, the graphics are so meticulous. Customers had several varieties from which to choose including hearts, shamrocks, religious symbols and even Heaven’s gates. The block lettering was simple and elegant.

Speaking of craftsmanship they appealed to the Woodmen of the World members to honor the brotherhood with a Sears Monument. You may have seen the tree trunk style stones at the cemetery.

wood man of the world grave stones

Unfortunately, just as the regular Sears catalog went defunct, so did the “Monuments & Tombstones” publication. By the early 1900s, Montgomery Ward also started selling funeral products via mail order too, but with a better payment plan than Sears.

Montgomery Wards Tombstones

Within a few years, as the United States entered World War I and subsequently World War II, mail order sales dropped significantly. In 1952, the catalog ceased publication.

Nonetheless, the advent of the Internet gave rebirth to mail order funeral products. Today, there are an endless number of websites that have urns for sale, headstones, caskets, funeral keepsakes, and memorial jewelry at a fraction of the cost at local funeral suppliers.

 

Don’t Mess With the Twins

hubbs

Hey, we’re all about the yard art and will probably be one of those old ladies with a yard full of statuary and obstacles to mow around. But this seems a little excessive.

Eccentric twin brothers Gerald and John Hubbs, Paulsboro, PA started erecting a display in their tiny yard four years ago. Since then, they have amassed a collection of 100 bronze figures crammed onto an all-concrete front yard about 50 feet wide. Dozens of finely crafted pelicans, tortoises, grimacing alligators, frolicking mermaids and fountains make up the collection. The house is surrounded by a locked chain-link fence.

The neighbors love it! Not. When the 59-year-old twins celebrated the Fourth of July by firing ceremonial bronze cannons in their backyard and activated a spiky metal dragon that spit flames, neighbors called the law.

Police charged them with maintaining a nuisance, fireworks violations, and harassment after neighbors said one of the twins screamed that he would kill her if she called police again to complain about the noise.

It is not the first time police have been dispatched to the Hubbs home. Six years ago, their lawn and driveway were dug up by police after their 82-year-old mother, Ethel, went missing. A former girlfriend of one twin had told investigators that she believed they had buried the body and continued to cash her Social Security checks.

A body was never found and the men were never charged.

However, during the search of the premises and a warehouse owned by one of the twins’ former wife, police uncovered illegal weapons, including an AK-47, booby traps, expensive jewelry, coins and allegedly forged documents. The Hubbs’, chiropractors and former registered nurses, were tried on more than 100 charges and given probation.

Source: Philly.com

Images: John Costello

True Confessions: I’m a Blogaholic

vintage postcard

Time management. Always a problem. And now? I’m addicted to blogs. The problem? Many that I read religiously annoy the hell out of me. Oh there’s a handful that I heart, but most? Can’t stand. It’s like an abusive relationship. The precious time that I waste on some of my bookmarked list could be better spent doing something I love.

My plan was to save the reading for in the evenings. Never happens. I HAVE to take a peek, not once but several times throughout the day. Am I a blog stalker? O.C.D.? My list needs to be purged. I have the power. The blogs that I have listed on my sidebar I adore, and will add a couple of new discoveries. But the rest of the self-absorbed whining nit-wits on my bookmarked list? Ditch. Must make the break. I need an intervention.

Thank you for letting me share. Pray for my recovery.