One funeral coming up.

My buddy passed last night and he's at peace. 

I have to go through the Irish Catholic wake/funeral ritual which I am very familiar with. I'll smuggle in a pint of Jameson's. It's my duty.

As he was laying there off of life support and breathing I whispered to him, "If you come around I'll sneak you in a cold beer."

Of course you expect me to write that he smiled or did some damned thing but he didn't. He didn't hear a damned thing. Later that night he passed.

Frankly under the circumstances if I thought I could have gotten away with it I would have shot him and given him a fast exit. The way we treat people is a lot crueler than we treat animals.

I have had two cats die on my lap in peace at the vet's office and my wife made sure Tokie didn't suffer but letting a human lay there in a vegitative state is outright cruelty. 

I have a sister that is a realist and she is the one that will call the shots if something like that happens to me.

In accordence with Irish Catholic custom he will be buried in the ground which is fine as he was another worthlesss Irish bum (like me)to begin with and that's what we do.

I am a sailor and will be buried at sea in a USGI mattress cover which reminds me that it is in storage and I had better fish it out and have it handy because I am closer to my turn then I think.

In other news there is a small binder with my final instructions and on the cover of it is an Elvira look-alike and it says that for $500 she will come to my funeral and stand away from the crowd in a sexy black dress, sunglasses, and weep bitterly and you are lowered into the ground to make your friends and relatives wonder what dark secrets you took with you.

For some reason my wife does not think it's funny but then again, she's not Irish. Virtually ALL of my family and dark humored friends laugh like hell when they see it.

They understand my book which I had bound and gold leafed, "Piccolo adventures in the Foreign Legion". It's a book of blank pages. I never served in the Legion.

Then again my wife was horrified to find out that I got even with my grandmother for pinching my cheek at weddings and saying, "You're next!" because I retaliated by doing it to her at a funeral. She doesn't understand that Irish Catholics take no prisoners.*

Adios, Neighbor Bob. I'm sure as hell going to miss you.

As of last night the neighborhood got a lot smaller.

*it's in your genes or it isn't. My niece carried on screaming about how she'll never be that way. Never! Never! Never! and someone said something (lost in history) and she snapped back with some SERIOUS dark humor.

BAM! Headshot! I wet my pants laughing. It's in our genes. It was in Bob's, too.

Neighbor Bob wasn't a Marine so Semper FI doesn't fit. Nor was he a shipmate. That doesn't fit, either.

I think that 'Later, Buddy' does.

Anyway what ever I say during the wake/funeral is going to piss someone off but I suppose it's expected of me.

I am SERIOUSLY thinking of popping a beer at his wake. He most certainly deserves it. Then again, I might do this at the funeral.

Good night.

To find out why the blog is pink just cut and paste this: http://piccoloshash.blogspot.com/2009/12/my-feminine-side-blog-stays-pink.html NO ANIMALS WERE HARMED IN THE WRITING OF TODAY'S ESSAY