MrsDoyle

Well then it’s “as you were” - back to your executor/family/friends to decide what to do. I personally don’t care. I’ll be dead, and I’ve done my best to avoid the fuss and expense.

I searched the university website for “body donation” and got a phone number and email address (dept of biomedical sciences).

There was a lot of info to read about what will happen. I had to let my doctor know so it’s on my medical record, and my best pal is down as the contact person. He has a phone number to ring so they can come and fetch my body asap, and decide if it’s suitable.

What inspired me was a documentary I saw years ago that interviewed a man who’d signed up for donation, then showed the process after he’d died, including dissection (from a distance). They also interviewed the students. It was very moving.

My body is going to a medical school, to be used for student dissection. Once they are finished with it, it will be cremated. My relatives can have the ashes if they want, otherwise it will be disposed of. My name will go up on a plaque in a special memorial garden. It was pretty easy to organise, just a matter of signing consent forms with a witness. Family are ok with it.

There’s a chance my body will be rejected - infectious, too mangled, whatever - and in that case it’s bounced back to family to deal with. I favour forest burial wrapped in an old bedsheet.

I saw the xkcd comic first and thought it was, you know, a JOKE. https://xkcd.com/3131

Carrot in a box made me laugh so much. I really miss that man.

I bought a pretty shell necklace in Samoa, and then asked the seller what shells it was made from.

He said… “Dolphin’s teeth.”

When I reeled back in horror, he chuckled and said, “Yum yum.”

I have various bits of jewellery made from beef bone, I happily wear leather, but there was something intimate about teeth that made it gross, plus eating dolphins, argh.

I like the Rebecca West quote: “I myself have never been able to find out precisely what feminism is: I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat.”

Well you SAY that, but one of my neighbours grew potatoes in her front garden, and there was a LOT of tutting. Really a lot. Everyone knows front gardens are for flowers, not potatoes. I’m surprised the police weren’t called.

I know that’s now generally accepted, but when I was young it was Old World (Yurp, Russia etc) and New World (US, Canada, Australia etc). But the poorer former colonies, the developing nations, didn’t fit either, so they were called the Third World.

I love haggis, and that’s all horrible bits and pieces cooked in a sheep stomach. No rubbery chunks though. I’ll give andouillette another whirl next time I’m in Paris, maybe I got a dud.

First-hand testimony: yes, it does taste of soap. Lick a bar of soap if you want to know what it’s like.

I ordered andouillette in a Paris restaurant once not knowing what it was. I had a little dictionary with me (pre-internet) that translated it as “chitterlings”. I didn’t know what that was either.

Never again - it had chopped-up bits of rubbery guts on it that resisted chewing, it was vile.

Just finished Empire in Black and Gold by Adrian Tchaikovsky, very much enjoyed that. I’ve just started Midnight and Blue by Ian Rankin. It’s off to a cracking start - Rebus is in prison, what the what now?

As ever though I’m reading dozens of books. Most disappointing is John & Paul, A Love Story in Songs, by Ian Leslie. I bought it after going to a talk by the author. I’m a Beatles fan since childhood, so I thought it would be interesting. Well I guess I’m not a REAL Beatles fan, because I’m finding it tedious. Chapter 7 and it’s still only 1962! I mean sure, it’s fascinating that as a child, George Martin’s family shared a communal lavatory with three other families, but please can we get back to the main subject?

Best of the rest is The Rise and Reign of the Mammals, by Steve Brusatte. Section 4 and we’re only up to the Cretaceous, lol. I love this book, not just for the critters, but for the paleontologists, some amazing characters with epic stories of working with teeny tiny bones.

Oh no, I’m sad to hear Bee Speaker disappointed. It’s on my list - I also loved Bear Head. I’ve just finished Empire of Black and Gold, first book in his Shadows of the Apt series. It was pretty good, good enough for me to try the next Apt book.

A lot of Nazis were Christians.

We live in a society. I believe that a predisposition to empathy, compassion, love, all those good things, is inbuilt in us to help maintain a stable, cohesive society. They are taught to young children, who learn to share, care, co-operate. It seems like some people never grow up, and still need a “parent” to guide them.

Ewwwwww!!

I’m never bored. What’s it like?

Morality matters, friend, even for atheists like me. The trouble with the “only believers can be moral” standpoint is that believers can end up doing the most heinously amoral things in the name of their god. Like burning people alive for example. Stoning sinners to death.

Now there’s an idea.