1513 Ashes to Ashes

Wednesday, October 18, 2007

I don't trust animal crematoriums at all, even the regulated and inspected ones. You send a 90 lb. dog, and you get back a cup of ashes. You send a 30 lb. dog, and you get back a cup of ashes. You send a 10 lb. cat, and you get back a half a cup of ashes. You send a 30 lb. big-boned Maine Coon cat, and you get back a half a cup of ashes.

Seems like there's a formula: dog = 1 cup, cat = 1/2 cup. I half suspect they cremate several animals at once, and then just apportion out the mixed ashes.

Not that it really matters that much. When you disperse the ashes in a loved place, it's really the idea that counts.

Speaking of cremation, there's something that has been bothering me for years. Humans don't burn down to powder. No matter what the temperature or time, there will be very brittle pieces of bone that kind of hold together and continue to look like bone. So the crematorium crushes the remains before they return them. When I scattered Jay's ashes on my mountain, there were many hard bits of obvious bone, the size of the pink part of my pinky fingernail.

Now here's what bothers me: there were no bits of metal. The man was full of metal. He had a Greenfield filter, and lots of clips and plates holding his skull together, and some other stuff. I expected to see melted pellets of metal. I didn't. Why not?

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Joke I heard recently:

A scientist goes to God, and says, "Lord, we don't need you anymore. Scientific advances have allowed us to now make the shape of a man from dirt, treat the dirt, and breathe life into the form. Now that we can do everything you can do, you can retire."

God answers, "You can create life? Show me."

So the scientist kneels down and starts scraping dirt into a pile.

God stops him, wagging His finger. "Uh uh. Use your own dirt."
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