Funny moments at funerals

[GwinCoch]

This isn’t really an AIBU, but thought it fit here the best. The other thread about dress at funerals made me think about how differently we all remember those we have lost. It also made me think about a very silly thing that happened at my Nana’s funeral where we all lost it to laughter.

I know there are cultures and people who believe in absolute solemnity. So this thread might not be for you, although of course you’re welcome here. But I have always found that laughter and silliness has made grief so much easier to deal with. So, this is a thread for funny moments at funerals. And for anyone who thinks that this is disrespectful or wrong, you are entitled to your feelings. But this is a thread for those of us who lost our mind to the giggles which were the other side of grief.

I gave another example on the other thread, but it was the same funeral - my paternal Nana. And because she never went to church but decided to be buried there (I have six relatives buried there) the vicar didn’t really know what to say about her, he didn’t know her. (That’s another issue for people to quibble about outside of this thread!) So my dad was working in Uganda, flew home and took care of all of the arrangements.

The service began: “And what can we say about this woman? Mother of five? Her middle son works in Uganda…” and the rest of the eulogy was about my dad’s job! Really?! We did the rest of the service and then went to the pub for the post-funeral and everyone was queuing up to talk to my dad - it was the funniest thing. We’re Welsh valleys we don’t mince our words but it no one was horrid it was just every minute “Raise a glass to Nana - but more importantly to her son who works in Uganda!” Everyone was howling and my dad kept saying: “She was a very private person!” We all call him SURNAME of Uganda now, like a Livingstone joke. He laughs about it too and has stopped defending it now!

At my mum's funeral my sister insisted that my then 8 month old not be seated in the front pews ( likely an attempt to make sure I wasn't there either but that's a worthy of a whole other thread) so my oldest friend offered to take her and sit at the back with her, DD liked Dfriend so all good. At a certain point the vicar requested that we all take a moment of quiet reflection to think about our relationship and memories of my DM at which point DD let out a really loud and hearty baby chuckle that filled the entire church, many stifled giggles followed. My DM would have found it hilarious.

My aunt chose her own funeral music. She was a big fan of Tubular Bells.

There is something undeniably funny about watching a coffin disappear behind a thick blue curtain, to the soundtrack from The Exorcist.

Standing outside the crematorium straight after the funeral of my DHs grandmother and a man trundles past with a huge council wheelie bin. Without missing a beat my DH said ‘Ah - there she goes’. We all fell about - my MIL particularly. Grandma would have loved the joke. It lightened what was a very sad day.

This is spectacular. I may steal this idea.

Aw, that makes me smile too ☺️

My granddads funeral. Went to pieces as we walked in and saw the honour guard that had come from his military organisation, then whilst sat listening to the service which was a wonderful humanist service with a fantastic celebrant I heard my partner trying to stifle laughter. Looked at him for him to whisper to me that he'd been at school with the officiant, and whilst there the officiants father had been a local police dog handler working on a major manhunt, and he , with dog, had got lost in local woodland and had to be rescued! Well the giggles were almost uncontrollable, but I know my grandad would have howled with laughter, as did the rest of the family when I told them later .

Funeral of an unbelievably tight old aunt of dh, she was notorious for it. Not many there, she was late 80s. Dh said a few words during the service, including more or less, ‘If she’d known how much this funeral was costing, there’d have been a screech of, ’HOW MUCH?!!’
And everybody cracked up.

Not exactly funny, but lighthearted - funeral of a very jolly friend, lovely bloke. Beautiful little ancient village church, very quiet and sombre atmosphere as we waited for it to start.

Then suddenly, as the coffin was brought in, a full-blast version of the G&S ‘With cat-like tread…’. - he was a great G&S fan.

The atmosphere lightened so much immediately - totally in keeping with the cheerful, jolly man he was.

My great aunt had 'Mine eyes have seen the glory' as one of the hymns at her funeral. Now, anyone who has been in Guiding or Scouting will know that there are a LOT of silly campfire songs to that tune. Her daughter is a Guider and great aunt also used to help out so there were quite a few Guiding members there. There was a lot of 'don't make eye contact' and stifled giggles during the hymn, then at the wake we had a sing song of all the different versions we could think of 😂

Not quite a funeral, but after a long delay because the council had accidentally transferred ownership of the family plot to someone who was already dead and buried in it (!) and then wanted their signature to authorise it being put into my name, we were finally interning my mum's ashes several months after she'd passed away. It was just me, DH and my dad, as we didn't want a big fuss. We were walking very slowly down between the graves because my dad was quite frail. There was a big flower arrangement on one of them, with a huge label on it saying 'From the neighbours'. DH pointed at the two graves either side and said 'I wonder if it's from this side or that side?' My dad and I looked at each other and just went. The poor undertaker was standing at the graveside looking most perplexed as we arrived trying to stifle giggles. When we got there, there was a huge pampas grass growing on the grave next to it. DH and I had watched a programme the night before that had made reference to swingers growing pampas grass in their front gardens, so we had to not look at each other or we'd have been off again.

I have a few.
At my friends nans funeral ,we were at the house afterwards with many relatives crammed into a small living room. My friend got up to go to the loo and her sister quickly took the vacated seat .
When my friend came back and saw her sister in her seat she exclaimed " oh jump in my grave why don't you!"

The morning of my husband's nans funeral my dad put his black tie on only to discover a stain on it. He sponged it off and was walking round swinging the tie above his head to dry it. We we all trying not to laugh and he rightly said that she would have thought it hysterical.

Finally just the other day at my friends dad's funeral,it was a burial so after the service we were slowly following the coffin back out
Me and my parents were at the back of the queue and my 83 year old dad says " I'm last out let's hope I'm not first back in!"

At the funeral of a dear friend. My phone went off in my handbag. I didn't want to make a fuss rummaging about for it - this was before I had a smart phone and it was really small - so I let it ring until it stopped -not very long thankfully. When I got home the first thing I saw was my phone on the coffee table. It hadn't been my phone ringing.

My mum and I viewed my grandmother's body before the coffin was closed. I remarked that it was the first time I'd seen the blouse she was dressed in without egg yolk stains on it. We both got a terrible fit of the giggles and couldn't look at one another during the service in case we set each other off. Pat (my grandmother) would have seen the funny side 😊

Not at the funeral, but making preparations for it. I ask the grandson, is there anything you’d like to say at the funeral, maybe a few words or a poem? Without skipping a beat, grandson lifts his shirt and goes, this! He’s got the poem tattood on his chest already.

The organist at the last funeral I went to was about 90 and very short. The first hymn sounded like she was missing a few notes here and there and the tempo was random but we all made an effort. The second veered into the territory of all the right notes but not necessarily in the right order and the priest looked mad. For the last one the priest stopped her completely and made us all start again. However the deceased had gone to that church for 50 years and the organist had been there for even longer and always played like that 😳 It was excruciating to listen to, especially at a funeral when you couldn't laugh!

My very upright, proper and 'stiff upper lip' grandfather had his funeral in a stunningly beautiful church with glorious flowers and a view over rolling hills and dales.

In the middle of the very respectful and graceful service we were instructed to reflect while listening to his favourite piece of music.

We composed ourselves in rustling silence and were expecting Vivaldi or some such but out of the speakers came this rip roaring track about whoring, dancing, poker and drinking.

There was stunned silence, then giggling as the lyrics got more outrageous then we were howling.

They had mixed up the music from an earlier service (the death of a well loved member of a biker gang)

First funeral graveside - 3 yo needed to do a wee. He dragged his pants down and turned to the grave. Whipped away quick smart!
2nd funeral graveside. Couldn’t see the 4 yo. I found him (or just his legs initially) on his belly under the drape that had been placed around the coffin scaffold. He was leaning into the grave to see where the coffin was. He was quite impressed at the sight and spoke about it for weeks after!

Granddad was cremated. One of the songs played at his funeral was Johnny Cash's Burning Ring of Fire. So many were trying not to laugh.

My oldest friend was giving the eulogy at her mother's funeral recently. There has been an in-joke for years about having a glass of sherry. She was just about to ask the congregation to rise and raise a "virtual glass of sherry" toast, when there was some movement behind her and the vicar handed her an actual glass of sherry!
Not funny, but mobile reception was never great where I live. In the middle of my husband's funeral I suddenly remembered that I hadn't switched the ringer off on my phone, so I spent several minutes scrabbling around at the bottom of my bag (not my usual one, which has a dedicated phone pocket) retrieving said phone and switching it off (and accidentally making my sister giggle at the sight). Good thing, too, as one of my oldest friends tried to ring me in what would have been the middle of the funeral service!

I love this! I’ve been in giggles most of the morning thinking about it😂

I quite fancy having Edith Piaf belting out Je ne regrette rien at mine.

At mums funeral the vicar sounded exactly like Gil Chesterton the food critic from Frasier. He looked like him too! I’m lookEd at my grown up son and we stifled a giggle. Turns out we were thinking the same thing x

I thought if I was the one to arrange my aunts funeral I'm going to choose "girls just want to have fun" Cyndi Lauper. It summarises her perfectly 🥰

Was at my gran’s funeral in a very Misty old graveyard in Scotland. Her grave was next to a stone wall separating the graveyard from a field.

After the coffin was lowered in and prayers said, I stayed by the grave for a moment whilst my relatives walked back to the cars.

I then started hearing this weird, muffled moaning which sounded like it was coming from my Gran’s grave.

”Oh FUCK” I thought. “Either ghosts are real or we buried her alive!”

Then common sense kicked in and I looked over the wall.

There was a sheep there.

My mam was a fan of Only Fools and Horses and we asked for charity donations instead of flowers at the funeral.

When the vicar mentioned the collection, my brother asked him to add in "no coins please, it scratches the pewter" from the episode Miracle of Peckham.

Certainly gave a smile to the people who where there. 😊

At my grandmother's funeral the priest began talking about her achievements. He mentioned that she'd learned to drive in later life, and then asked "Was she a good driver?" Cue lots of shaking heads from the pews. In an attempt to move on, he then mentioned her many children and how she'd looked after the whole family. "Cooking every night for them all - was she a good cook? "
More shaking heads.
At this point he smiled and said "So, to summarise, not a good driver, not a good cook...."
We were in bits.