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The Redacted Podcast
Join Matt Bender, a U.S. Combat Veteran, and experience his unfiltered and uncensored conversations with our guests, each maintaining complete anonymity, as they share the most raw and authentic true stories, from secrets to forbidden topics, frightening experiences to interesting occupations. Tune in, as we explore subjects and narratives that often dance along the fringes of society.
The Redacted Podcast
Mortuary Mysteries: What Happens After We Die?
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In this thought-provoking episode, Matt, sits down with a seasoned funeral director to uncover the intriguing and often unsettling truths about the funeral industry. From the morbid realities of body handling to the emotional complexities faced by families, this conversation delves deep into the gritty details that most of us prefer to avoid.
Our guest, who has been in the business for nearly 40 years, shares candid insights about what it takes to work in this field, the unexpected challenges, and the often overlooked ethical dilemmas. Learn about the processes involved in embalming, cremation, and even body donation, as well as the emotional toll it takes on those who work behind the scenes.
Discover the secrets of the trade, from the use of embalming services and prep rooms to the stark realities of disinterment and body transport. Whether you're curious about what happens after death or looking for practical tips on how to navigate funeral arrangements for a loved one, this episode offers a rare glimpse into an industry shrouded in mystery and taboo.
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We were talking on the way here. This would have been a cool Halloween episode.
Speaker 2Yeah, it would have actually.
Speaker 1Friday, the 13th September. Is that September? Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2Pull up in a hearse and a body in the back.
Speaker 1Da-na-na, da-na, thank you. Okay, thanks for tuning in to the Redacted Podcast. I'm Matt Bender. Behind the scenes there we have our producer, pamela, who's been sworn to secrecy. There we have our producer, pamela, who's been sworn to secrecy. She's running all the controls, making me look good as I can and sound good, and then we have our guest here today. Thanks for coming in, thank you. You're welcome, our guest today.
Speaker 1So this is this one's a little weird for me and I'm so curious about it. But I was kind of, if I'm being honest, dreading doing this and and I'm sure a lot of people are the same way it's like one of those things that's inevitable. Everyone's going to meet you at some point. Everyone meets you, right? Yes, you don't get out of this. I mean, I guess you could sink on a ship or something, but everyone, pretty much, is going to meet you at some point in their life. But we don't want to think about that, do we? No, that's a. It's a morbid, weird thought. And you do what? What is it that you do? I'm a funeral director, director, funeral director now. Yes, sir, how long?
Speaker 2have you been doing that? I got in the business in 1986 in high school. I went to mortuary school in 1993 and 1994 in Dallas, texas.
Speaker 1So you've been in the funeral mortuary. Business man, what's it? 40 years almost. Yeah, yes, holy cow, you've seen some things. Oh yes, yes, what, um? What got you into that?
Speaker 2because you were a young man then, yeah, I was like 16 years old. I kind of got into this is going to be it actually paid the most as a kid, Like back when those days I went just $3.50. My friends worked at Wendy's and the funeral was only $5 an hour. So I went and worked there and I just thought it was kind of just something different, to be a different job. I get to wear a suit to work every day and you know it's not a bad gig then.
Speaker 2You get to wear a suit to work, be clean and you make a little bit more.
Speaker 1Yes, you're not working out in the heat no, not getting dirty all day.
Speaker 2No, it's pretty much driving a hearse around and answering the phones up front on the nights and doing night visitations.
Speaker 1Wow so um 40 years you've almost been doing it, and I mean even now. I mean we can talk about that, but is that a good industry for young people to? Get in it seems like maybe it's something a lot of people don't want to do, so it pays more yeah, it's a good industry to get into because a lot of people can't just handle them. You know people upset and just bodies, bodies, yeah, stuff like exactly.
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, it's good business. I mean, everybody gets out of the mortuary school, has a job pretty much instantly because people are posting at the school they have openings for jobs. So it's pretty much instantly, because pre-norms are posting at the school. They have openings for jobs. So it's pretty much gradually. You're gonna have a job, yeah.
Speaker 1So if you were a young man or a woman and you know, the thought of that kind of thing didn't bother you it's probably not a bad career.
Speaker 2No, not at all.
Speaker 1No yeah, um, and it didn't bother you obviously. Oh no, not at all, and you've never kind of had second thoughts and it needs to be done. That's the other weird thing. Like we like to shelter ourselves from it.
Speaker 1Exactly, but it needs to be done. Yes, somebody has to do it. Exactly that's the dirty work we don't want to see. Exactly so we're willing to pay for it. Exactly so, we're willing to pay for it. And I think that maybe even is kind of a symptom of modern times, because funerals or these kind of things or bodies used to be handled by the family. If you're talking about small villages, you know, go back before the 19th century.
Speaker 2Oh yeah, exactly, yes, I mean that wasn't a business.
Speaker 1No, no, it was handled by the local people, the family. Yes, they would take care of that. Yeah, exactly, but now we've kind of just kind of contracted that out, yeah exactly. Yeah, if you could, and this is something I don't really understand. I mean, all of us have probably been through some kind of us normal people that don't work in the industry, us laymans, you know, we kind of understand maybe the process a little bit, but how does it really work? So, you know, grandma, grandpa, dies at the hospital most likely, right?
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1They're going to a hospital or maybe they're found in their home or something like that, or what do you call it? Assisted cares or the what's the one where they they live assisted livings. Yeah, yeah, yeah, something like that. What happens? You get a call. Okay Is what. That's the step.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1You got to come retrieve the body.
Speaker 2Yes, actually, these days most of the if your grandmother died tomorrow at 3 am in the morning at the hospital basically most hospitals here in this area would transfer you to the morgue and they call the funeral home to come make the removal. But now most funeral homes have removal services. Do the removals Like in the old days, they actually went up and did the removals themselves. Now they have removal services contracted out. After the removal was done from the funeral home you're probably going to the funeral home's refrigeration unit and stay there the night. The next morning, you know the family probably come in the next day.
Speaker 1The refrigeration unit. What's is it like a big walk-in cooler?
Speaker 2Yeah, a big, huge walk-in cooler drippy down on the sides you know, yeah, cold like, just like a big meat fridge actually like something you'd see at a restaurant or yeah, yeah, it's like. Yes, it's like 30, like 30, eight degrees somewhere there.
Speaker 1It's really cold 38 degrees and then is it just, you're just on a rack, or?
Speaker 2yeah, you're on your stretcher, or they have like racks, almost like bookshelves, where they put you on the racks and they're well, they can't do anything. Any process past then until they have the family, like come in and see what they want to do with the body, if they want to you know your grandma to be cremated or embalmed and um, if they cremate, they don't embalm right?
Speaker 2yeah, obviously yes, there's been a few situations where the person they want the body to be have visitation, so it's embalmed and cremated. But usually it's not cremated, okay, just in certain situations. Okay, then the next day the family comes in and if there's a prenatal or at need, like the prenatal means it's already paid for, the funeral's been paid for beforehand, okay, and there's no money. But there's an at need means you know the person died. They had no pre-need, so that's a.
Speaker 1What's that word you're saying? Maybe I'm not understanding. Pre-need, pre-need.
Speaker 2Yeah, pre-needs. Like you have the funeral home. Like me, I'm 55 years old. I go to the funeral home today and talk to a funeral director about paying in advance. Like you know, make payments on my funeral when I die 30 years down the line.
Speaker 1So it's a pre-need contract and you can actually go in and say you want you pick out your own casket and you know. And this is to not be a burden, yes, it's not to be a burden on your family. That's the idea. I mean obviously it's like okay, it's already taken care of, I've got everything set up.
Speaker 2All you got to do is sign the papers and show up yeah pretty much exactly, and we'll then go to the cemetery and pick a cemetery plotter, unless you're getting cremated, okay. And then you're a veteran, of course you can go to the veteran cemetery and veterans get free burial. Okay, but not a fee funeral, just a free burial.
Speaker 1Okay, so they're going to give me a hole in the ground for free.
Speaker 2Yeah, you and your wife or spouse. Perfect, and. I don't know if it's a funeral home. At a cemetery they're actually very too deep. So the first person dies goes in first and the second person goes on top.
Speaker 1That's a veteran cemetery.
Speaker 2Yeah, a veteran cemetery. There is some like that around this area too, but veteran cemeteries are always like you're stacked on top of each other, so people realize that, and I mean, I guess that brings me to—it just made me think of something.
Speaker 1We're in Florida. Yes, how the hell low is the water table.
Funeral Industry Practices and Procedures
Speaker 2It's low. I mean, that's some stories I was going to get to about. You know, most of the places around here when they're burying a body, they put the vault in first the vault, then the casket.
Speaker 1The vault's concrete. Yeah, the vault's concrete, like a concrete cast thing.
Speaker 2Yeah, like a liner for the casket. And around here you bury, dig more than four feet. It just fills full of water. So usually the cemetery workers are sitting there with a vacuum sucking the water out of the you know and then they're digging it.
Speaker 2Yeah, and most people don't realize that a lot of times when they're burying the body, they want the family to stand back because the water just keeps filling and filling. They usually put in a casket down in the water, not deep but maybe a foot of water, yeah, cause this gets, you know, just filling and filling up.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2In Florida. That I mean, know, just filling and filling up. Yeah, in florida that I mean other places, you're probably. Yeah, like texas I've seen. When I was in texas I remember them have the dynamite, like you know, the dig, chisel and bedrock yeah like austin and granite.
Speaker 1Yes, wow um, so just going back, so that the family decides, and then you're embalming or Cremation.
Speaker 2You know the family decides to have the body embalmed, probably the next day. You know the body will go to the prep room be embalmed. You have the family, you know, go home, pick up some clothes for the body to, you know, bring back maybe that next day. You know, have a range of funeral, like two or three days down the line, like if they're Catholic so they can have a Catholic service at the Catholic church and that's arranged out with the priest and the time they can have a service. But pretty much then after their body's embalmed the family brings the clothing back, pretty much, dress the body, they have the casket, big guy put the body in a casket and then usually bodies. Most people are in the back in the prep room like another couple days for the, you know, because usually people aren't dying, you know dying and it feels like three or four days later. So you're gonna be back in the prep room for at least three or four days usually is that is that the cooler, or um if?
Speaker 2they're embalmed, they are out of the cooler. But if they're um, if they're embalmed, they're, they're stable.
Speaker 1Yeah, they're stable, they're embalmed, they're out of the cooler, but if they're embalmed they're stable.
Speaker 2Yeah, they're stable. They're good for three or four days. I mean they do hard embalmings or soft embalmings like harder, like during the winter, like up north. If you're dying in Florida and you're going to be buried in New Hampshire, they got to hold the body somewhere for a while until the snow goes away, so they bury it. So there's like we have bodies held.
Speaker 1I never thought about that.
Speaker 2Yeah, their bodies are held embalmed in the refrigeration unit for maybe two or three months until the snow goes away up in New Hampshire, vermont.
Speaker 1Because the ground's frozen.
Speaker 2Yeah, so they have to hold it here until they can fly the body up there to be Don't die in the winter.
Speaker 1Yeah, exactly yeah.
Speaker 2Oy, because the funeral homes there don't have enough room to hold. You know that many bodies. You know you can fly five or six, but not, you know, over three or four months. You're building up a lot of, you're backing up. I guess the word would be You're overflowing. Yeah, exactly yes, oh, wow, exactly yes, oh wow. And that's in in funeral homes up north, yes, northeast, mostly florida, we're fine, yeah, florida. Yeah, texas, we're good in texas.
Speaker 2yeah, um, that's kind of crazy to think about too, yeah I mean, just think you die in december 5th and then you can't be buried till maybe april. You know if you're buried in New Hampshire, you know what I'm saying, new Hampshire.
Speaker 1I feel like every funeral I've been in is like spring or summer. Nobody dies in the winter. So I'm originally from Chicago, oh yeah.
Speaker 2Well, the winter down here is different because they have the snowbirds and it's more busy here. We have a season because during the season we have way more funerals during the season, because more people are down here dying, you know. So it's, it's.
Speaker 1It's busy in the winter, more busy in the winter I can imagine, yeah, I mean we get a huge population of, yeah, older people, retired folks, yeah, things like that, so that's and that's probably a lot of transport. So sometimes you know you're uh, maybe you're flying a body back yeah, we um have a um ship out container.
Speaker 2The body goes and ship out of their involvement goes and ship out container. Take it to like delta cargo or jet blue cargo and then you have, then they um ship it up north so it goes on a passenger yeah, passenger plane always belly in the belly of a passenger, yeah and it's always all you.
Speaker 2It's always on first and off last, because I picked up bodies literally off of planes, like before why is it on first and off last? I'm not sure to tell you the truth. I don't know. There's always been one person take them off last maybe.
Speaker 1Yeah, that's weird.
Speaker 2Yeah, I don't know the answer.
Speaker 1Sorry, so they're. And is that an embalmed body? Yes, yes, okay, so that's embalmed. So you're embalming it and prepping it here, yes, and then you're putting it on a plane and maybe they're going to have their services and burial up somewhere else.
Speaker 2Yes, also in situations like, especially in Florida. A lot of times you have like a like somebody say you're going back to Chicago and you know you live in a neighborhood here, so you might have a visitation one night here in your casket and then the next morning you know we'll put the whole, put you in a ship out container in the casket and then ship you up to Chicago and you have another service there and then buried. So sometimes you might have two services, you know your Southern and your Northern service.
Speaker 1That's strange yeah. I've never heard of that, but I guess it makes sense.
Speaker 2Yeah, maybe you know it's for you know neighborhood people.
Speaker 1Yeah, yeah, if you had friends and stuff.
Speaker 2It's like a visitation that I had before maybe from five to eight o'clock at night.
Speaker 1So then, um, you know, you have the services and everyone kind of knows how that goes, and then they either do the burial or it gets sent out to cremation, right, yes, okay, and there's like, I mean, it's there's like central crematoriums from what I understand. Yes, yes, sir. So the funeral homes, I think probably used to. Some of them probably used to do that.
Speaker 2Yeah, like the funeral home I worked at, we've two of them I worked at in this area. They both have one has one crematorium and one has two, so they have their own crematoriums.
Speaker 1yes, Okay, so some of them do.
Speaker 2Yeah, but you know you have to wait until the death certificate is signed by a doctor. You can't discriminate a body without a death certificate signed, in case there's any foul play or anything, just in case.
Speaker 1Can you bury a body without a?
Speaker 2sign. Oh, no, you have to have a doctor or a medical examiner sign a death certificate. There's a third option you can have, also I was just thought about, is donating your body to science and then your cadaver, oh yeah, yeah. And then in Florida you're taken to Gainesville, orlando or University of Miami, so you can, other than that, took them bodies up to the science center.
Speaker 1So you can have your service get involved. Yes, and then you're donated.
Speaker 2Yeah, just your cadaver. Then you're pretty much a Jane Doe or John Doe. After you arrive at the college.
Speaker 1They remove all the names.
Speaker 2Yeah nothing, college, they remove all the names and yeah nothing, you're just the no more name ever again. After that, there's a weight limit also. You can't be over like 240 pounds, I think okay yeah, but that's such a weird thought yes, well, we're still on earth here living.
Speaker 1Yes, to have to think about all that kind of stuff. Yeah, it's so gb, it makes me gb. Yeah, but necessary I think it's.
Speaker 2It's nice to have done your body of science and you have like kids going to college to be a doctor. Can your cadaver and it's necessary once again.
Speaker 1yeah, like that's necessary, the whole, your whole industry is necessary, but 99 of us don't have any involvement in it. No, not at all. You know all customers, all customers. My grandpa used to say people are dying today that never died before.
Speaker 2It was like one of his little whips that he would say I so the first place I worked we used to go to the bank with the funeral director on the funeral home. We got the bank and the banker and say how's the business he goes? It's not too good today, but I got a couple prospects. You know, it was a little joke.
Cremation Process and Funeral Industry Insights
Speaker 1That's a good one, I like it. So in this industry and I mean we talked a little before the interview, before the interview what are maybe some of the things, or disturbing things, or kind of below board things that people don't know about, that they should like the secrets of the industry. What would you say some of those are like. Well, I'll pose one question to start. When somebody gets cremated, is that actually their ashes?
Speaker 2Yes, it is. But actually the crematorium, the retort, when, after you're cremated and you're just like they have to, you're just like bones, like brittle bones, and you're put in a processor and processor is it like a roller crusher that like crushes your bones?
Speaker 1so you're not completely burned ash.
Speaker 2No, you're kind of like this. Once you're in the retort they get a like a big scraper and they scrape your ashes on in the middle of the crematorium in the retort. And then is that like a.
Speaker 1Does it look like a brick oven?
Speaker 2yeah, it is exactly exactly thing. Bricks is a brick oven, pizza doesn't. Yeah, it is Exactly the exact same thing bricks as a brick oven pizza does.
Speaker 2Yeah, exactly, and it is. And then I've seen those people, those bricks fall like the break and they just put them in there with the ashes. But actually when you're cremated you're brought out to a box and then you're put in a processor and the processor is like this grinding machine, that kind of grinds you to this like a cheese shredder thing, and then your ashes go to another box below that. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2You get the fine powder, yeah, the fine powder. But then the crematorium isn't exactly. You know, they don't clean it 100%, so there could be 1% of somebody else in that corner, but it's mostly. Yeah, it is Because when you're died they put like this little silver coin tab with a number on it, a serial number. They put it with you on the body, so when that comes out it's still like that silver number on it. Okay, like a dog tag type thing actually. Yeah, so they know it's the same person. It's all documented pretty well, okay.
Speaker 1And then I mean they give you like the Chinese food box.
Speaker 2Yeah, the Chinese, it's like a little. Yeah, like a takeout box. Yeah, it's like a black box. Unless you buy urn from the funeral home, then you're transported to that urn. Is there extra? No, there's never extra, but there's never extra.
Speaker 1So you're not wasting any of it. No, no, no, You're getting 100% of it in that box? Yeah, no matter how big or small.
Speaker 2Yeah, you're getting it all back and people don't realize the crematorium is like 1,600 degrees, 1,600 or 1,700 degrees to cremate a body. How long does that? Take A person like, let's say a person like 180 pounds, that takes two hours.
Speaker 1You know it's like wow yeah about two hours.
Speaker 2It's longer than I would have thought.
Speaker 1Yeah, because it's a process. Is that expensive? It's?
Speaker 2like a lot of gas or something yeah, are they gas fired? Yeah, they're all gas fired.
Speaker 1Yeah, yes, wow, yeah so, um, what, what other kind of? I mean, like I didn't know, know about the bone crusher, that's kind of yeah. The processor that, yeah, that's morbid.
Speaker 2I thought it just burned it. Oh yeah, it's just like a pile of, like you know, bones, but it's brittle and you just put them in that. Yeah, process it down at that. Yeah, looks like cat litter.
Speaker 1It's like that pretty much, yeah. And then what are some other things that are kind of? I say, I mean like Maybe people wouldn't know about or expect.
Speaker 2Probably like in Florida, like you must be put in refrigeration within 24 hours. I mean like within the time you die. Yeah, I've seen funeral homes, when they're real busy, just leave bodies in the prep room without be put in refrigeration within 24 hours. I mean like within the time you die. I've seen funeral homes, when they're real busy, just leave bodies in the prep room without being put in the— you know they have no room in the refrigerator so they leave bodies out in the prep room and unbalmed and you know not be in the refrigerator. But technically in Florida, most states it's 24 hours you have to be refrigerated. And I don't know Like just—I've seen and I don't know like I'm seeing disrespect for bodies. You know you're laying there and people are making fun of people's bodies and stuff like that I mean.
Speaker 1Tell me about that.
Speaker 2Making fun of you know, like men's penis size stuff like that? Oh my God.
Speaker 1That's my worst fear.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1If I die, they're going to laugh at my wiener.
Speaker 2Yeah, I mean I said this joke when I came in I saw a guy with a big shlong. I always say his wife's going to miss him, and then you know, like that's all I say. But if some guy had a little piece, I was like I don't know, there's all kinds of stuff with them. I don't know like saying they dress like sometimes like say, there's a clothes casket and they say they bring the clothes to dress the body and I've seen people just put the clothes like lay them on the body, not like dress them, just kind of lay the pants on them and then shirt on them and don't actually dress them and like you have decomps and stuff you can't dress. You just got to put the clothes on top of the body bag stuff like that, or you know what does that mean?
Speaker 1a decomp?
Speaker 2yeah, decomp, like um person, it's like like, especially in Florida that's been found for over after three or four days you start decomposing pretty bad, you know gaseous and turning purple and skin-flippage.
Speaker 1Oh, so someone died in their home and nobody knew about it.
Speaker 2Yeah, they'd go to the medical examiner first, because then make sure there's no foul play, and then we have to pick up the body from the medical examiner's office and then that's going to be closed casket. For sure. Yeah, we have incidents, though, where people like somebody like it burning a fire really bad, and the mom wanted to have to absolutely see the body. You know like they just demanded to see the body and you say you want to think about your son's last time you see your son up, you know burnt yeah, and they have to sign a um paperwork so they won't sue the funeral home for like um showing them.
Speaker 2Yeah, like they came, but they have to sign some. There's no liability with a funeral home Like if you have.
Speaker 1PTSD and nightmares, yeah, stuff like that.
Speaker 2So they cover their self. We have times before where people are really bad in car wrecks. They look bad and sometimes we just cover them up with a sheet and just let the family like to hold their hand for one last time. Without seeing them you can get around. You know kind of come to a certain point with people where I didn't think about all that.
Speaker 2Yeah, like, in other words, restorative art too. When you went to mortuary school there was restorative art where, like wax work, we're learning. You know somebody shoots herself in the head and you know, do wax work? Yeah, silk.
Speaker 1Like makeup and yeah, yeah, wax work.
Speaker 2Yeah, a lot of wax. Is that actual Like?
Speaker 1what you'd use for Halloween costumes.
Speaker 2Yeah, it's like a wax putty. I see people make ears and all kinds of stuff you know, mostly for car wrecks. Or somebody shot theirself not in the mouth but on the head. Yeah, a lot of makeup. It's all smoke and mirrors kind of thing. It's all smoke and mirrors kind of thing.
Speaker 1It's all smoke and mirrors, I think people actually like I mean, I can imagine, but that'd be a hard decision. Like you want an open casket if you have something like a head wound from shooting themselves or a car accident it's like they have to trust you a lot. Yeah, because you ask them right, you receive the body and then you're like okay, do you want?
Speaker 1an open casket or a closed casket, yeah, and then they pick open. There's a lot of trust there, yeah, that they're not going to look. It's not going to be more horrifying, because if you mess that up, I feel like that's horrifying. Like if it just looks like some Frankenstein stitched together. Mr Potato Head, yes, like they're going to be very upset with you. Has that happened?
Awkward Reality of Funeral Preparations
Speaker 2Yeah, there's been situations also where someone dies in a car wreck and before we make a removal we call the medical examiner Because the family wants to know is the body viewable or not. You'll call the medical examiner and they'll say, yeah, he's viewable. Then you'll get it and he's not viewable at all. But you already told the family the body's viewable. You know what I'm saying. So you're kind of— so you're not— yeah, that's happened. A bunch of Don't ever trust anybody's opinion unless you actually see the body yourself. You're talking from your perspective.
Speaker 1Yeah, whether or not it's viewable.
Speaker 2Yeah, because medicals never see so much stuff. They're like, oh, it's viewable, but they're busy too. They're just like yeah.
Speaker 1Yeah, I mean they probably. I mean maybe they're right. 95% of the time?
Speaker 2Yeah, 95%, but that one time you know the family's upset, you already told them they're viewable.
Speaker 1Yeah, yeah, yeah, and now you've got to work at it, yeah. So in all your time doing this I'm sure I mean you're doing special effects, kind of makeup almost, and recreations. There has to be a lot of people that were kind of like unhappy.
Speaker 2Oh yeah, it's not what they expected.
Speaker 1Yes, people's. Tell me about that.
Speaker 2It's always the women. The hair is always wrong or their lipstick's too red. They say their mom was like a whore. You know, like they just freak out and a lot of people you know, when they're in a hospital care for two or three weeks, they kind of get watery kind of. You know face kind of blows up a little bit from. You know all the liquids are on and the medication and I always want them to look like they did. You know, like 10, 20 years ago and they get you just look nothing like you did and this is terrible and you know get really pissed off at us and we just want to close casket. Now it's like it was the hospital that you know the fluids are on and built up their face, puffed up their face and yeah yeah, so it's mostly like that kind of stuff.
Speaker 1But is there ever like like you try to remake an ear and it like fell off?
Speaker 2we've had stuff like that well I know some happened a couple times or somebody looked at it. They're like I could still see the bullet hole, or, yeah, the burn, or whatever they always want to like, touch the like, go behind the head and touch behind the head with their hand, and sometimes they'll put plastic on the pillow, but they can't see it just on the back of the head.
Speaker 1So, in case it does leak, we're talking about the family wants to. Yeah, it's like them.
Speaker 2Just, people are always curious. They want to like look for the you know where the person was embalmed, and they want to pull down their shirt and stuff like that.
Speaker 1Are you talking in, like the family viewing?
Speaker 2yeah, yeah, because sometimes there's like a family viewing yeah, usually the family comes in first, so usually like immediate family, yeah, first make sure everything's okay and yeah, yeah, they can have their, or they call it the short, one's called a peep and weep, like peep and weep, and then get the peep. Yeah, that's what it's called. You don't tell that to the customers unless they're cool, yeah, and you're like all right.
Speaker 1Do you want the peep and weep? Yeah, well, you.
Speaker 2Well, you know, the other thing is back in the. I feel like I'm old now but like in the 80s we used to have those smelling salts. So you pop them and put them there, because we had a lot of people pass out or fake pass out, like you know, fake pass just drama queen type, people that want to make a scene. Yeah, fake pass out. Yeah, there's been a bunch of watched. I mean, I've seen um purgings when, like um, after you aspirate the body, they, you know, like I've seen like people in the casket and like a little bit of purge comes out their mouth.
Speaker 1It was like kind of like during the service or something. Yeah, because it's just like yeah, especially in hot weather.
Speaker 2Um a little, you know, coffee comes out of the lip and you can see it. I've seen seen people, their director, go up and rub his elbow on it with his you know. So the family doesn't see, you know.
Speaker 1So the director went up and cleaned the schmutz off, Well, kind of like with his elbow you know, like real slick in front of the family, like you know, put his elbow on.
Speaker 2Yeah, the schmutz exactly.
Speaker 1I mean it's a dirty business, it's a dirty job right, yeah. I mean that is a dirty job and you know something like that. Someone's trying to the director's trying to give dignity to the situation. I mean that's kind of. The purpose is to give dignity to this very uncomfortable, very sad situation.
Speaker 2Yeah, Now another thing is sometimes after like two or three days, like a flight say, you're in Florida four days. Then you fly to Chicago by the fifth or sixth day you're getting a little ripe in the casket and you open that casket up and you know you're having a visitation. You can kind of put a little Oseum on the body. They have a thing with like this um, it's almost like a sawdust, it's like a potpourri sawdust. We put in the bottom of the casket, like under the casket, like under the bed of the casket, to so the family won't smell the body. Because after you know three or four days, you know even a good embalming, you know you're gonna get starting to turn.
Speaker 1Yeah, let I mean see this once again gives me the Jeeves it it. It does You're. I mean, you're used to this. My listeners they're not. I'm not, yeah, but I think the big part of this is this is real. I mean this, yes, how else would you want it done? You know, what else are we supposed to do? There's an element to that, yes Of like. Yeah, I mean, this is the way it is. This is the bare cold truth. Yes, of it is bodies decompose.
Speaker 2Yes and they stink.
Speaker 2Yes, and we're trying to make this as good of an experience for you as possible, and that's kind of Also we have disinterments before where people want to be like they die in Florida and all of a sudden they want to be buried in Chicago with a family and we've had disinterments for after one month they died, five years after they died, like those are pretty gory. You pull them up, yeah, just in turn. We use it after hours and you know, in Florida it's usually a casket full of water and you know soupy mess.
Speaker 1Do you?
Speaker 2open it, no, no, but sometimes the caskets are leaking.
Speaker 1The caskets still survived.
Speaker 2Yeah, some of those caskets. There's non-sealer caskets. The cheaper caskets are non-sealers. You know, like the refrigerator seal on the side there's seal caskets and there's non-sealers. And non-sealers get water in them automatically. The lower-end caskets.
Speaker 1So buy a sealer casket. Yeah, buy a seal casket, yeah.
Speaker 2Spend the money for grandma, yes.
Speaker 1Is it so the thing they're in at the funeral, at the wake? I guess you'd call it right. Is that what? They get buried. Yes, okay, yes, so I've heard sometimes that that changes.
Speaker 2Can you explain?
Dirty Secrets of Funeral Practices
Speaker 1I don't know um, can you explain? I don't know. There's like a. Sometimes they'll have a like a casket to just be in for the viewing and then they'll be buried in a different one. Or am I making shit up?
Speaker 2oh no, there's been like. There's rental caskets for like people are getting cremated. We have a rental casket we use okay, maybe, maybe it's just an old casket and you actually put the body in there for viewing and then you take it out and cremate it later. But I've seen people move from caskets a couple of times, but not very often. Okay, unless it's a cremation casket.
Speaker 1Yeah, Maybe I just made that up, I don't know. Could have been.
Speaker 2Yeah, I've never seen that I don't know anything about this.
Speaker 1Yeah, yeah, um, what are some? I mean, what are some other little weird things people might not know about, or maybe secrets, or just like disturb, what's something disturbing you've seen put it that way, like something just where you're like, oh, come, come on, what the fuck?
Speaker 2Like it just eats at your conscience a little yeah just man, there's a lot, oh shit, can of worms.
Speaker 1Yeah, what's the most disturbing thing that you've been like? You've either seen something happen or somebody else do, where you're like what the fuck? That's horrible, yeah I mean it's a dirty industry I mean it is it's? It's a dirty job I'm not saying the industry is bad, but it's a dirty job and there's bound to be in 30 years, 40 years, there's bound to be some of that shit.
Speaker 2Yeah, I mean, I've seen people like when the people die. Sometimes I see them keep pooping, like when they die. They're on that liquid diet, so it's keep pooping. I saw a guy one time get like there's a, it's like a web roll, they call it. It's like almost cotton, but it's a roll of cotton, it's a roll of cotton, it's a roll of cotton and it's called Web Roll. And he kept pooping and the guy just got a bunch of Web Roll, pooped the guy's ass and got a broom and kind of shoved it up there. So he quit pooping everywhere. And I've seen big women with big fat women with big boobs and they hang off the side and I've seen a couple of directors just put the boobs together and just get get a. It's called the baseball stitch. When you sew the baseball stitching he's going to just sew her boobs together, literally just sew them together. So stay up. That's for dignity, I suppose, right.
Speaker 1I guess, but it's like the family doesn't want to know how it happens, but they don't want to see it.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1Right, yeah, you can't just have flopped off the side of the cat, yeah. That doesn't work.
Speaker 2Yeah, I mean, I've seen stuff like that. I mean, people are laying there just naked, oh yeah, and just exposed Like once again horrifying.
Speaker 1I think To some people Maybe not everyone, but maybe a lot of people and like what the fuck? There's got to be weird shit that happens, oh yeah, Somewhere in there.
Speaker 2Yeah, there's a lot. I mean, when we were real busy, I've seen people put two bodies on one table, like two slim person, two thin people, like on one table, just because we had no room to put bodies, the bodies up on the top of cabinets because we had no room on the tables. Yeah, when it's really really busy, things like that was pretty undignified. I think legally in Florida you have to be two feet off the floor. I've seen these bodies. We're in a room and these bodies are in stretchers, but on the low down stretchers, all the low down stretchers, like all the way on the bottom, just throwing them on stretchers.
Speaker 2Busy season, yeah, busy season snowbird season yeah, snowbird season here, yeah don't die during snowbird season.
Speaker 1No, die in July die in July.
Speaker 2Yeah, bumper sticker. Yeah, die in July it rhymes yeah why it rhymes, yeah, why not right?
Speaker 1Yeah, Die in July and don't die in December. In Maine.
Speaker 2Yeah, exactly, don't do that either. Yeah, you're going to be stuck a while Just be sitting around. Also like the longest person we ever had, like sit was for another reason. This guy wanted to be at the National Cemetery, the one in Virginia, the big one.
Speaker 1Arlington, arlington, sorry.
Speaker 2And if you can get in there. You've got to wait a long time and this guy, we had him for like 11 months because it takes so long to get to Arlington. It's like a backup. So we had him in the refrigerator for like 11 months before he got buried in Arlington. Yes, so does the family go to that then? Oh yeah, they'll go to Arlington, yeah.
Speaker 1I've been there just to see it, but I've never been to a funeral in Arlington. But yeah, that seems strange, Like somebody dies and then 11 months later you got to put the black stuff back on again, yeah, and do they call you like hey, is he?
Speaker 2cool. Yeah, yeah, they call him. He's fine, he'll be fine.
Speaker 1He's in the refrigerator embalmed.
Speaker 2Yeah hard as a rock.
Speaker 1Man, that's such a weird thought, yeah. And then for you guys like, okay, I mean, this is what I'm picturing. I'm picturing like you have the funeral home and the nice rooms with the nice furniture and it looks like something out of you know Buckingham Palace and it's all like everything's like 20, something out of you know buckingham palace and it's all like everything's like 20 years out of date, exactly. You know floral stuff and and you picture that.
Speaker 2And then you have like the, the cold room you know the embalming area, the prep area and that's so that looks like a kitchen. Yeah. Sterile cement yeah, so is it kind of like a kitchen?
Speaker 1Yeah, all sterile and cement. Is it kind of like a kitchen? Yeah, it's like a kitchen, Commercial kitchen, like stainless steel. Stainless steel balming.
Speaker 2Floor drains. Floor drains Well, some of the floor drains are actually the caskets are tilted into like a men's urinal. It's like the men's urinal.
Speaker 1Yeah, and that's where all the they just flush everything right down the urinal, like all the blood after the embalming, and yeah. So when they're embalming, you're what, what I understand about embalming and and I got this actually from another guest that we had, um, that was talking about it but you're pushing the fluid in and then the blood comes out yeah, basically you're um a basic person.
Speaker 2You're, you're cutting the uh, you're injecting the carotid artery and the blood's come out of the jugular vein. So you're pushing to right up here yeah, on the clavicle, um you're pushing collarbone, um you're pushing, you're pressuring fluid into the carotid artery and it's pushing it out of the jugular vein. So you know, you said the flow of blood coming over your neck, you're laying down. But if you're really hard in bomb yet to raise the, the criminal arteries in your legs and embalm through your legs also, isn't that by your groin?
Speaker 2yeah, you're crying, yeah yeah, okay, well, your femur bones and your femoral arteries, but yes, you buy your. Sometimes they're just people aren't bombing. Sometimes you Like your femur bones and your femoral arteries, but, yes, sometimes people are bombing. Sometimes you've got to do four posts. You've got to bomb both sides and both femurals. That's like heavyset people or people with really bad clogged arteries, people that have heart attacks and they just have bad clogged arteries.
Speaker 1Okay, yeah, so then you do that. You do that. Is that step one to prep? Is that step one to prep?
Speaker 2Yeah, step one to prep you get a body.
Speaker 1That's step one, yeah.
Speaker 2Pretty much put on a table, set their features, like you know, you put the eye caps in their eyes, close their mouth. There's two different ways to close their mouth. You have a mouthpiece and you use like wires and you shoot the wires in their gum line and then you twist the wires in the gum line like almost like a bread tie to their mouth shuts. There's another way in old days it's like you go through the mandible with a needle and then you come up to the bottom of the mouth and sew their mouth shut like that. But that's the first thing you do. You set their features, then you embalm oh, okay, you know, because you don't want them set. Then we shave them. If they're a man, some women too, you shave them and you know it is. And. But then you have to when you get done with that.
Speaker 1Does your hair grow after you?
Speaker 2die. They say they do. I never like, not like, not, you never know. Yeah, okay, yeah and um, when you're done well, after you're done with the bombing, you have to aspirate the body, you have to get a trocar and you stick like two inches above their belly button. It's a big, long rod and it's like as a suction thing and you're sucking and you're sucking all the the stroke car. It's a big long rod, probably like three feet long, and so hooked to a suction device and it kind of sucks all the gases and the shit out of your bowels.
Speaker 2So like, like your stomach yeah yeah, pumping your stomach, yeah unless you go to the like I was saying. When you donate your body to science, they embalm you, but they don't do the the uh trocar, because they'll destroy all your you know, all your organs.
Speaker 1Sorry, yes. Like the first time you had to do that.
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah. First time I actually saw it was like 16 and the guy the You're 16. Well, I didn't do it. But then prep the bomber. Like had the big long rod trail car. He goes I'm about to do this and you got the bow, you go two inches up and over and you stick it in there and you're just like sucking all the gases and crap out of there so you don't blow back up pretty much.
Speaker 1Once again, it all makes total sense. Yeah, it's a dirty job, that needs to be done, but at 16, you see that, are you like? Were you like? What the fuck?
Speaker 2Yeah, you're like what the hell? You know fingernails and you know clip the nail, you know stuff like that.
Speaker 1Small things also. All that's involved in that. Yeah, jeez, that's crazy. What else? What other kind of weird stuff might not people understand? Or what other kind of I don't know. You know it. It's hard for you because you've worked in the industry. So it's hard for you to know what would disturb or maybe make us curious.
Speaker 2Yeah, like most people like think like the body, when it's removed, is I was saying the second straight to the funeral home. But most funeral homes have a central prep and most families don't realize that your mom or dad is not at the actual funeral home, at a prep room, maybe 10 miles away, maybe 20 miles away, getting prepped there. So you don't understand that your body is not going straight to the funeral home. It might be going to a prep room for a couple of days, not the actual funeral home you called. Because there's actually a couple in this area. There's a couple embalming services that are just like big warehouses and all they do is embalm for funeral homes and they dress them if they want them dressed and they do removals. Also, because it's totally different now. When I was younger, in the late 80s, if you called the funeral home, you actually called the funeral home, you know, and somebody's funeral home answered and the guy that answered the phone was a guy staying in a dorm upstairs. He'd go make the removal at night.
Speaker 1That's like old school stuff.
Speaker 2And now it's like you call an answering service up in New Hampshire and they call a removal service to do the removal, and then the removal service takes it to your central prep room Not usually your funeral home, but usually your prep room, not maybe you not use your funeral home, I use your prep room for the embalming service and all that stuff's.
Speaker 124 hours, yeah, 24 hours.
Speaker 2And people realize like and it's a system, it's like a well-oiled oh yeah, yeah it works, oh yeah, it's great.
Speaker 1Yes, I mean that's, that's kind of a good thing, yeah you're not waiting on gus to wake up and come stumbling down.
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, and all these are, you know, prepping guys smoking a cigarette and ashes are on the body. Why is embalming?
Speaker 1Nobody does that now.
Speaker 2No, maybe vape, but not you know, they're vaping yeah, new world, but it's just, yeah, it's a millennial thing.
Speaker 1Right thing right there?
Inside the Funeral Home Refrigerator
Speaker 2yeah, but people think, well, you call the funeral and the body's going to the funeral home. Usually 90 time it's going to a prep room somewhere. You think it's just a warehouse? Yeah, it's not really at the funeral home until the day what does this warehouse look like?
Speaker 2it's just a big, huge, it's a big warehouse and it's got a refrigerator, holds like. It's just like like racks you can put. They have the machine that almost like a like forklift, but it's kind of like a forklift. They lift it up and they put the bodies in the racks. You can bring it down. There's like 100 bodies in their refrigerator. They put them in cardboard boxes and they're just numbers like B3, a4. When you bring the body you've got to put this body in B3 shelf or D16 shelf. So when you go back you can find the body.
Speaker 1You sunk my battleship.
Speaker 2Yeah, exactly yeah, because you don't realize you're in there with a hundred. You know it's kind of. Even now you walk in a big fridge and see a hundred bodies, all you know the smoke, the refrigerator smoke, you know coming in and it's an area.
Speaker 1And then there's like a prep table outside.
Speaker 2Yeah, a couple of prep tables separately, and then people are just embalming. Yeah, just embalming.
Speaker 1Yeah, what's the? What's the mood in there? Like, is it morbid, I mean, but it's a workplace.
Speaker 2These guys are here every day.
Speaker 1Yeah, they're talking about their vacations.
Speaker 2You always have the creepy embalmer guy, kind of like the lurchy guy that doesn't talk to anybody. But then you got everybody else is joking around like hey, you know the Cowboys last night, you know at the football game, yeah, yeah, you don't really always like I said Don't talk about the Cowboys down, no, no. Don't do that. But you know how's Dolphin.
Speaker 1How's Brady, but you.
Speaker 2You're talking. It's like the people are just like donuts. You don't really think about bodies anymore. You've been around your whole life. It's like that's just a donut, that's not even a person, it's just like whatever. You know you don't really think about it. You don't go home and think about like people think oh, I can't deal with. See everything, yeah, those are hard. Baby funerals and kid funerals. You know you can't. You mean during your whole life and I'll get over. You know I don't have any kids but you just can't get over. 12 year old kid getting hit by a car. You know like they hit and run. That happened in venice like a year ago. We had that funeral and you know the guy like you can't.
Speaker 1You know you the guy, like you can't you know, you can't ever get over that, you know like it's hard to get over stuff like that. It's a it's an important job to do. Yeah, Somebody's got to do that.
Speaker 2Yeah, the thing I remember, the one with the girl that got hit in Venice by the hit and run. She's wearing a backpack and then the casket. They had a closed casket but the backpack she's wearing all tore up and the mom put one of the backpack on top of the casket just to like. I don't know. It's kind of weird. It was tore up and like just to symbolize that tragedy happened, I guess.
Speaker 1People grieve in different ways. Oh yeah, what are some of the maybe kind of odd ways you've seen people grieve, because not only are you doing all the prep and all that kind of stuff, but you're also there at the visitations and through the funerals, like you're involved in that whole. Yeah, a lot of times like, what do you see that's unusual or that maybe people wouldn't understand?
Speaker 2One thing I see a lot of funerals is people that get together that hate, like, say your mom dies, you hate and you're, you get to your brother, you hate your brother and you haven't seen your brother in 20 years. And there's always a lot of drama at funerals because people have to show up at funerals and like, yeah, and I've seen like fights and just this bad vibes between families and mama, probably some you know, like a lot of people fighting over rings and stuff because mama promises ring to five people. I've seen a lot of. I've seen fistfights at funerals. I've seen people you know drunk, you know they deal with it with Xanax and wine. You know people deal with it in different ways. It's totally sloshed out at a funeral, you know.
Speaker 1What about, like some good reconciliation? Have you seen that, or you don't? Maybe you're not paying attention to the interpersonal stuff so much.
Speaker 2I'm trying not to really. But you one thing I've always thought, if you know, this is kind of, if you don't like, say my dad, he's still alive. I mean, I don't get along very well and every time I had a funeral, when somebody dies, it's oh, this guy was a great person. This guy was so great. I've never seen a funeral I've been to like thousands of funerals in my life and my dad I'd say my dad's an asshole. I've never seen a funeral where I'd be like you know, my dad laying in the casket. He was a fucking asshole. You know what? I, everybody's me, and my life, like 80% of people are good and 20% are bad. But so I don't know, I guess people, everybody, when they die, is always oh, this is a great person, and you know what I'm saying. I mean, I mean Charles Manson, oh, he's a great person. I don't know. It's just like I never see anybody talk bad about somebody at a funeral. You know, I've seen it strangely enough.
Speaker 1Oh, that's Kind of like a weird therapy session. Yeah, it was like a big shit talk and it was just uncomfortable. I was like, oh man, this is weird, I have to get out of here, but at the same time probably healthy in some way.
Speaker 2Yeah.
Speaker 1Because you get to kind of leave your issues right there. Yeah, exactly, and get it off your chest instead of just carrying it around. Yeah and um you know, I've always heard like, like, um. Somebody told me once during some controversial things at a funeral I was part of that funerals are for the living. That's what it's there for. It's there to help us. The person who died is dead. Whatever realm they're in, wherever they are, wherever they go, they're not worried about any of this.
Speaker 1No, this is you know, maybe they zapped off to heaven or wherever they ended up going and this doesn't concern them. This is silly.
Speaker 2Yeah, exactly, you know you're dead.
Speaker 1Now You've moved on, yes, and it's to help the people that are here, to kind of heal, I guess, and get some closure. What are some insights you've had working in this industry? Have you had any kind of revelations or thoughts about death or thoughts about life. Does it make you appreciate life?
Reflections on Mortality and Dark Humor
Speaker 2more. Yeah, it makes you appreciate being around the field business. One thing it does make I can't speak for everybody but me I appreciate life, like every day you live. I'm not a religious person, all, but I do appreciate. Like every december I travel out of the country. You know, bike race. I do comedy, you know I always do. I want to like you, send it home like you're living. Yeah, you're living, because people you go to like to old folks home you see people laying in beds and you're like I mean one thing, I, one thing I have done is look at people in caskets when they're there and like, as this person do, do they do everything they want to do in their life?
Speaker 1you think that?
Speaker 2yeah, I really do. I think that they went like me. When I die, like if I died today, I've done, like 95, I've done, I call, I've seen all the traveling I've done. I've done what I've, you know, stuff I've done your.
Speaker 1It's your bucket list. Yeah, I hit my bucket list.
Speaker 2But I was like, if you want to fuck a midget, you know, does he fuck a midget?
Speaker 1You know what I mean. You know I'm saying everything you know what I? Mean Like, but you always wonder did you fuck a?
Speaker 2midget. No, I want to, but but you know I really do think about it. People like to live. You know, like some people, like when I lived in Texas, some people only went to like three states their whole life. You know like they went to Oklahoma, arkansas, and you know what I mean, like they didn't see anything in their lives. They didn't really experience much. They just lived in Bastrop, texas, in a trailer home and had three kids and you know it was like Never left. Yeah, they might me.
Speaker 1That'd be like that's death for me. I mean just like, yeah, I do think about the people you know a lot of them, so you get to see that end cycle.
Speaker 1Yeah, so it's like, but does it ever? I feel like for me because, once again, most of us don't think about this on our daily basis. Does it ever? Just, it nags at you. You know what I mean. I mean like to think you're seeing this, this is the end, yeah, for this guy, and you're thinking that is it almost like a ticking clock that you can sometimes yeah, here, I'm working in death, this will be me. Yes, you're embalming a body, burying, putting it, transporting it. I'm working in death, this could be me.
Speaker 1Tick, tick tick tick, I just feel like that's.
Speaker 2I knew that. Yeah, I think about also like.
Speaker 1I didn't mean to creep you out.
Speaker 2No, no, it doesn't make sense, though, but you do think about that a lot, and like a lot of one thing, I say another thing. If you don past me personally, you live past 77, that's 77 77 I don't know why that you live 77 or above that's you know, that you, you lived a lot, you know. I'm saying you, yeah, you shouldn't cry about them passing because they might have been a boring life, but they live.
Speaker 2You know they lived through yeah at least people all the time that die of 55 years old, die of skin cancer, and you know all kind of stuff, pancreas, I mean like you know anything.
Speaker 2Can people understand that? Because that's. And one thing also people, I see a few homes like I do. Tell people like we, we see what 99 percent of the world doesn't see every day. I mean, people don't. People are at cubicles of dell computers and old cubicles on the computer. They don't see. You know, they don't see this. It's just you kind of just forget about that. You know you're just like this is this is what I'm doing every day for work. You realize there's some guy, joe, at. You know microsoft and a. You know that's all you do.
Speaker 1I don't know he's, he's focused on that yeah that's his job yeah and you're in yours, which is, I think, to a lot of people, kind of a slap, slap in the face of reality, yeah, yeah I feel like I would if I had to work in that kind of industry. That would really kind of echo, but I think most of me, but maybe, maybe in a positive way, because that's like okay.
Speaker 2Yeah, I think most people just think they're immortal. They see it, but they think they're immortal. I have a motorcycle. I never ride with a helmet on. You do? I don't wear a helmet when I ride.
Speaker 1You're going to have a closed cap. I have a closed organ donor but they're going to scoop you up.
Speaker 2Yeah, you just think. I don't know. It's like you take care of the dead. You'll never die.
Speaker 1I don't know it's just most people don't think about it too much no use, right, yeah, no use yeah, they come.
Speaker 2Time to go, time to go, I think so did you ever?
Speaker 1um and this is kind of a weird question, but it kind of struck me and something you said earlier most people don't like to think about it like I don't, the macabre, you know the, the morbid, the, the other side, the darkness most people don't. Some people love it if you ever, like, been out at a bar and you're like, yeah, a funeral home director, I'm an undertaker, and some girl's like, oh, oh yes, yeah, some people are in in that, I mean they're into it, yeah there's, there's a sect of people that, for whatever reason is, is into the dark.
Speaker 1Yes, and they don't. They want the grit, they want the. They like that.
Speaker 2Yeah, exactly and usually if you're at a bar with like five people hanging out, most people want to hear my stories, not their stories. You're like, oh, what'd you see this week? You know kind of more, yeah, yeah, but you always have. You can always one-up everybody, you know, but they just want to hear your stories, because death interests people, but not a guy that sells tires at Walmart.
Speaker 1You know that's not interesting, you know it's like, oh okay, well, once again you have that one percent, or maybe it's even less of people that understand that side of the industry sometimes kind of bad.
Speaker 2Just want to go at the bar and relax, have a drink and you just want to not talk about death. But the people want to. You know people always want to.
Speaker 1You feel bad just they know what you do.
Speaker 2Yeah, friends, and such and just jokes. I I mean like oh I don't know, there's, I don't know, just old stupid jokes. People say the old cliche stuff.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2Like you know, that's what you let you down and all that type of stuff and people dying to get in there and shit like that. You know the old cliche ones you heard your whole life.
Speaker 1I had that one too, passed by a cemetery. Pass by a cemetery, it'd be like good place. I'd be like, yeah, you'd be like people die to get in there.
Speaker 2Yeah exactly that's. But I was in mortuary school. I am lived in a funeral home and that's like I was saying, that's a good way. Girls want to come back to the funeral home and check stuff out you know, they just want to be creeped out.
Speaker 1They want to come there and look for ghosts.
Speaker 2Yeah, ask you have you ever had sex in a funeral home? Have you ever had sex in a casket? Have you ever had sex in a hearse? You know people always want to know what have you? A funeral home, yes, a hearse, yes, not a casket. People want to ask you if you ever had sex with a dead person.
Speaker 1I never had but people always ask you that too. Maybe not in.
Speaker 2Texas, arkansas is fine.
Speaker 1Arkansas. You can have sex with a dead person, Just get the old.
Speaker 2Never mind. I used to do a joke. I got fired from my job last week for sexually harassing a client. The bad thing is I work at a funeral home. My uncle got me in the business. He's a really bad embalmer but a really good puppeteer.
Speaker 1Oh no.
Speaker 2That's a good bad embalmer, but a really good puppeteer, you know. Oh no, that's a good one. Yeah, that's, that's my own stuff.
Speaker 1You kind of laugh about some of it.
Speaker 2Oh yeah, you got to laugh about it.
Speaker 1If you didn't laugh, you'd cry yeah, um, what's something you could kind of? Everyone that's listening to this is going to come to this decision at some point in their lives with a loved one or even for themselves. What's a few tips or advice or kind of things to ask or look for that they could make sure they get a good value and they get the best experience? Like you know, don't buy this upgrade, that's stupid anyway. Or maybe you know, make sure the funeral home does this, this or this, what. What are some kind of practical tips?
Speaker 2I probably personally. But one tip I'd I'd probably always stick with a family family on funeral home, not a corporation on funeral home. Okay, this is a. They're more personal and corporation. There's a lot of corporations SCI Foundation, partners, lohman Group so many corporations on funeral homes, like in this town there's only like two funeral homes that are family-owned. I'd go for a family-owned funeral home because you know, probably the body's going to be your mom or dad or loved ones when you take them back to their funeral home, not a prep center or an embalming center, and they're kind of more personal touch, you know, because it's not all about it's more personal touch is it more expensive for family?
Speaker 2no, no, it's probably. You probably actually probably get a better deal there and I would never. I would just buy. Don't buy the you know 12 gauge bronze casket. Just you know this, spend that if your person dies. I think they want you to spend money on yourself like go, you know, a celebration of life, take a trip yeah, take a trip, take everyone out to dinner or something, because once you go on the ground, it's in the ground. Nobody knows what the casket looks like. You know once it's in the ground it's people.
Speaker 1Sentimentality gets the best of them sometimes, because I think, yeah, the family's kind of bent over this weird barrel of grief and you know they obviously love this person yeah, and flower flowers are a big waste of money.
Speaker 2I mean, I know flowers are pretty but they're so expensive and they just last like two or three days and it's like such a waste of money because the casket sprays are like five hundred dollars and well, you can see two thousand dollars worth of flowers, oh yeah easily.
Speaker 2I mean I mean basic. I mean I think all the time, like the big Italian funerals I've been to in the East Coast look like John Gotti died. There's like thousands of dollars of flowers and flower shops. That's a scam in itself. Everything. There's so much money. Oh my God. We used to get paid actually Bird Dog fee commission. If you know him, call and say I'm from Louisiana and I need to order some flowers, can you recommend somebody? And if we recommended a certain funeral home and they ordered from us, that gives kickbacks on it. So I used to make extra money just on the kickbacks from the flower homes, flower shops, a lot of stuff like that goes on.
Speaker 1So don't waste money on flowers.
Speaker 2Go with a family-owned funeral that would be a good thing yeah, anything else any other.
Speaker 1Don't get a limousine, just drive yourself.
Speaker 2Yeah, drive yourself. I mean, um, that's about it. Really make sure, ask the family it's a family-owned. Ask them where the your loved one's actually going tonight, Like where is she actually going? Like really press them on that. They can't really lie about it. I guess they can. But you know, like I think stuff like that, I mean that's the main thing, I think.
Insider Insights on Funerals
Speaker 1That's good. Well, thank you for sharing your stories with us. Okay, we appreciate it. You have an. It's enlightening, yes, it you have. It's enlightening, yes, it's interesting stuff, and it's cool of you to come on and share all that. So we appreciate it, thank you. And to the listeners out there, thanks for tuning in. We appreciate it. Until next time, stay out of trouble and we'll see you in church. The Redacted podcast is produced by myself, matt bender, and my wife, pamela bender. Make sure to go out there and give us a like, a share, share it with your friends, rate us. Every little bit helps. Thanks for tuning in.
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