Well, the last few days have been a learning experience. We found out, for instance, that coronors want cash up-front (though they'll take a cashier's check or a money order). If my Mom and Dad hadn't felt that an autopsy was as necessary as we did, we wouldn't be getting one. On the downside, we now owe Dad $3000 - ouch!

Funeral homes, on the other hand, have payment plans - 1 year, same as cash! This is good, in that people actually get buried. On the other hand, the prices are stunning. Literally. Rob isn't stunned by too much, but he was practically speechless when he called me from the parking lot. $8900 for a pared-down service - some of the expense is because of the autopsy/delay/DadW. wants to view the body, but even without that, it would still be running very steep. All for a woman who stated baldly and repeatedly that if it were legal to toss her in a hole in the backyard, that's what she would want. Funerals are for the mourners, though, not for the dead, so the funeral is what it needs to be.

At some point we'll be having a memorial service up in Long Island, where Ma lived almost her entire life. Most of her friends still live up there, and most of them can't make the funeral. I was thinking to make it at Thanksgiving, which was Ma's favorite holiday, but DadW. is emphatic that he wants us down at the house with him instead, so that's what we're doing. It's going to be very strange doing Thanksgiving without Ma, and I expect that having it in the house, with all the memory-provoking things around every corner, is going to be hard on Rob.

He gets home late Monday and wants to go to work Tuesday. Somehow I think I'm skipping karate on Tuesday.