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Turns out that half of my blog fans don't know who Jason Statham is.

Mom, click his name and it will take you to a YouTube montage.

The other half of my fans (my Dad) just did not care.

Short Attention Span or Dementia Onset? Disappointment Either Way

I am swamped. How can this be? I am unemployed. My children are in school all day. I am not sleeping too much, am not addicted to anything, don't watch TV for more than an hour or two a week. I can only conclude that I am being abducted by aliens for three to eleven hours a day.

Wait, this is the internet: The author does not believe she is being abducted by aliens. She is fully aware that her family, neighbors, friends and an evil demon named Facebook are filling her hours with amusements and requests for her attention. She likes alien abduction as an image only. And if she could please have an alien who looked like Jason Statham, that would be just grand, thanks.

I never have time to blog so the only way I am going to make my remaining two blog fans happy is by writing in small bursts. Nothing so radical and asinine as a twitter feed, mind you, but brief nonetheless.

My conclusion of the day is that adulthood is all about realizing that you are a sad disappointment to yourself. You have three choices in how to respond to the disappointments.

1. If you can move past your daily failures in your own eyes, you get to have a fulfilling mature life.

2. If you are unable to get past your own disappointments you develop a voice like Ray Romano, Jerry Seinfeld, or Ben Stein.

3. If you don't disappoint yourself you are a self-important blowhard who rides around in a bus with your own name on it. So wrong.

With this in mind I am going to take in stride the fact that I have never been to Egypt to visit one of my dearest friends whom I adore and fret over often. I will not obsess over the fact that I almost never go out dancing even though at 20 I swore to myself that I would not be one of those sad sacks who goes out dancing less than three times in a month. And I will calmly realize that there is a block mother on our block and she is not me.

Adult decisions done. Now I am going to have some cookies before dinner and dancing.

Funeral Directors Congregate - Boston Runs Low on Whiskey

My apologies to the fine people of Boston, Massachusetts. I have spent my fifth work related trip there but have failed to see the sights or have a decent meal yet again. Somebody could make a fortune directing business travelers to a real restaurant, but that is a rant for another day.

Let's talk death, my friends! I went to another Funeral Convention. This was my fourth national convention and my worst fears have come true. A person CAN get used to walking into a convention center to the sight of acres of caskets, hearses, and urns. For the first time I did not get that jolting urge to run or laugh too loudly out of nervousness upon entering the convention center. Bummer.

As I do every year, I have some great offerings for you of the latest products and innovations in the death care industry. What I choose to blog on each year is the absolute best the convention has to offer. Or the weirdest things you could possibly think of, depending upon your point of view.

First up - for those of you looking to go green but wanting something cozier than bamboo. How about a casket or urn made entirely of wool?

Yes, let that sink in there for a minute. The Brits are always my favorites at these conventions. The English will make you a wool casket while the Irish chat you up about old Father Ted episodes (more on my beloved Pat in a moment.)

The company is Hainsworth. The products are completely biodegradable wool. Yes, they are soft and sturdy. And I think this is brilliant!

I have a devoted reader originally from across the pond who has been gently nudging me to get my green cemetery going before he takes his final saunter through this life. Jim, I think you would look stunning in the brown casket. That and a couple of tens of thousands in a personal loan to me, will get you the green burial you have been looking for.

My buddies at the Irish Dirt company came back (See last year's posts from Orlando.) The economy has been hard on Irish Dirt according to Pat, my main dirt man, but that's a story as old as time. It is such a great product, though, that I have decided to sell it on my Death Club website. It should be available in January if I can get the kinks out of the website.

Just a refresher: It is dirt. From Ireland. You can be buried with it, have it sprinkled over your grave, get your ashes comingled with it and scattered together; or, for the unimaginative, you can grow shamrocks in it.

My buddy Pat, the Dirt Dude, has this fantastic accent that is often impenetrable as he mutters something that sounds like it could be laced with expletives, rue, and innuendo. Turns out when I get him to repeat it - he is not talking dirty - just talking about death and dirt. He also supports me in my love of "Father Ted" reruns. I love him.

While yukking it up with Pat at Irish Dirt Convention Headquarters one afternoon I was heckled from my buddies a few booths down who yelled out, "Look out, Pat! She'll flirt for dirt!" (Funeral Insurance guys sure are a jealous bunch.) Will someone please inscribe Flirt for Dirt on my tombstone?

It was a funeral convention. There was whiskey involved. Sadly, I missed ALL the antics. Pat and the insurance boys assured me that having missed escapades at half the Irish bars in town (and in Boston that is saying something) my life is meaningless. What a comfort.

Next installments from the funeral convention: Bad jokes about salad shooters and cremains, some beautiful urns, the hottest hearse ever.

All Ghouls' Day

This is a solemn day at Auspicious Jots. We take this holiday very seriously and are appalled by all who would undermine the reason for the season with irritating jingles, crass merchandise, and blatant consumerism.

Tony Hawk (pictured below) and I wish you a very serious Halloween full of contemplation on the meaning of your life as witness to carved pumpkins, door-to-door neighbor visitations, and bright blue hair. See our disdain? We are overflowing with our self-righteous indignation aimed at those who are inappropriately mindless of the power of mayhem and empty calories in our lives.

May all the good tidings of the season be yours. And NO, you may not have the t-shirt.

Death Club in Life

I have been working the extensive behind the scenes building of my death club website and had hoped to have it half up by November 1 (Day of the Dead). But deep down I am a Luddite and this has made me want to hurl my laptop into the river. There have been considerable complications in the site creation process. The Undertaker Buddy and I have even been reduced to mutual fussing which is not what either of us had hoped for. It is his fault, however. (Ha ha ha ha ha ha. He doesn't have a blog so I can just hurl lies about for my own amusement. Not his fault at ALL.)

I've also been on grief delay losing my aunt and grandmother within two months of each other and having the responsibilities for the funerals of both. It makes picking out t-shirts for Death Club feel a little too close to home.

Updates to come include my report on the 2009 National Funeral Director's Convention with pictures, the link to Death Club, Death Club's holiday calendar, and the latest Death Club video. I will also probably post a tribute to both my aunt and grandmother. All of this and Halloween just around the corner. I am feeling ike I am more than the president of Death Club - I am living Death Life.

At least they serve peanut M&M's here.