At home last night we were discussing funerals, not our own of course. Teri had been to a funeral earlier in the week and had been rather taken aback when someone announced it was time to view the corpse.
Now in my family we have never been corpse viewers. Coffin lid down every time for us, but among Teri's lot the Irish influence is strong and "the viewing" is a big thing.
Well my wife is not a corpse fan and politely declined the offer. As usual she was highly amused by the coments of people coming out of the viewing room which, in accordance with convention centred on how well Uncle Jack was looking.
I would have wanted to shout "Looking well? He's dead, you can't get any iller than that."
That kicked off a set of funeral stories which on balance I think I won with this one:
I was on a bus passing Wigan cemetry where two middle aged women boarded and began to talk about the funeral.
"Ah didn't like that dress they done her up in."
"Well she were never a smart dresser, allus a bit flashy you know."
"Not like 'er 'usband. Ee were a smart feller."
"I know, that suit they buried 'im in last year were lovely. "There's plenty of men would have been proud to get married in that."

All my life I have been tormented by the question "before or after the corpse had been buried in it?"