I don't want to be cremated after all. That was my original plan, you see. No muss or fuss, the family gets a nice ceremony, say goodbye with the ol' ash sprinkle picnic, everybody goes home happy. Side benefits include not becoming worm food or the victim in some Frankestinian madman's experiments. You know me - I'd end up as "Abby Normal" for sure. And if you think of it cremation is really the only sure way to limit the necrophiliacs to a few choice days of abuse.

Unfortunately I've uncovered a flaw in my plan. You can duplicate the error very easily. Take the bag out of your vacuum cleaner. Cut off one end. Empty it. Look inside. What do you see?

Dust! There's still dust in there! Dust is fine stuff. It sticks to things. When they dump your ashes there's going to be some of you left inside that urn or Ziploc baggie (the container depends of course on whether your relatives spent actual money on your Shake-N-Bake moment or if they sent you out on the cheap).

And what happens to the leftovers? If you were urn bound you get washed away down the sink and into the sewer system. Oh, yay. Either a one way trip to the sewage reclamation processing plant or you end up in the East River. Depending on where you live.

God forbid your family lives in the boonies. Eternity in the septic tank - how does that grab you?

It's even worse if you were slag in a bag. You're trashcan bound at that point. Oh, you don't think so? Just exactly what do you expect the grieving kin to do with a used plastic baggie with a thin layer of you-dust in it? You're going into the can and from there to the dumpster and then to the land fill. Or the East River.

So dumping the dust proves problematic. The alternative is being cosseted on the mantelpiece of one of your whacked-out aunts or being stuffed in the back of your widow's (or widower's, as appropriate) closet. Oh, come on - do you really think they're going to get laid with a bottle full of your ashes around? Back of the closet (with last year's shoes) is about the best you can realistically hope for.

If they do keep you on display it's just a matter of time before somebody accidentally knocks you down and spreads you all over the floor and cleans you up with the Dustbuster, thereby fulfilling the awful prophesy of doom that says you are going to end up in a landfill. Or the East River.

Nope, none of that for me, thank you very much. I'll go traditional and let my rotting corpse take up some pristine park land for a few decades until they pave me over for the next strip mall. But I'm leaving specific orders for the coroner to implant a razor in my asshole. That'll show the necrophiliacs who's boss.