Welcome!

I'm Oliver Webber, here with my research assistant, Kaydence Ribetnauer. You may not be able to see us because we're tucked in between these blades of grass, waiting for our next meal to fly in and land on one of them. To nourish our bodies and souls, we ponder leaves. We encourage contemplation... especially in regard to issues that will have to be handled when we become worm grub. We hope to motivate others to thoughtfully cultivate preferences and decisions while still vigorously leaping around. We recommend croaking... using voices to broadcast wishes before it's too late to have a voice in this matter. Other than a sumptuous supply of insects, this is assuredly the most "toad-ally" considerate gift we could leave for our life companions! Don't you agree? We invite you to get your feet wet by joining our pond of pondering pre-planners. Let's make croaking meaningful!






Tuesday, April 23, 2013

Funeral Home ART GALLERY

Fly'Bye Lady Visit In FLORIDA

WINTER PARK

Upon entering the room where services are conducted at the Carey Hand Cox-Parker Funeral Home, one might notice a sort of dichotomy.  If you look to the right you’ll see a typical altar area with chapel-like appointments.  But a scan of the entire room easily summons images of a banquet hall.  Instead of chairs lined up in straight rows, as is common for any services, there are round tables with chairs around them, suggestive of wedding receptions or the like.  The arrangement immediately evokes a more casual stance than one might ordinarily adopt in a funerary environment.  A few steps across the hall lead to an art gallery!  Renovation of three former viewing rooms created what has been dubbed a “happy room.”  Amid high-top round tables with tablecloths accented by sparkly netting, white walls are lined with stimulating artwork.  In typical gallery fashion, ceiling track lights accentuate the individual pieces that can be perused and purchased.  


So there are a lot of variations on the theme out there in the real world.  Has this travelogue whet your appetite?  Maybe now you’ll have an urge to rev up your engine, pick a spot, and go there for some invigorating exposure to death management styles.  You may capture a chance to meet and greet “travel agents” – the specialists who navigate routes toward final destinations, according to their own state codes and perhaps also their own unique approaches.  At the least, you'll encounter attractions that aren’t apt to be found in travel guidebooks!

Monday, April 15, 2013

STOREFRONT FUNERAL HOME

Fly'Bye Lady Visit In FLORIDA

LAKELAND

Though the Casket Store and Funeral Chapel is a full-service funeral home, its exterior is different because it is located in the corner of a strip mall.  Its interior, likewise, diverges from the norm because it is efficiently compact, with a gathering space accentuated by a large desk, a chapel, and a selection room adjoining a large room full of casket models.  The number of these burial receptacles poses a significant contrast to the growing absence of them in standard funeral homes.  Instead of sample caskets or pieces of them, representations of them have trended toward the use of kiosks or large-screen monitors to serve as catalog substitutes for perusal of products.  




Monday, April 8, 2013

Heath FUNERAL HOME

Fly'Bye Lady Visit In FLORIDA

LAKELAND

Thanks to the addition of a modern building that was annexed a few years ago, the Heath Funeral Chapel & Crematory has an updated facility that lends both enhancement and diversity.  To complement their funeral chapel, a large reception room with an outdoor patio can accommodate up to 150 people for any type of catered affair.  But it is accessed directly from the parking lot, so community functions or private events can be conducted there without exposing folks to a funerary milieu.  However, the design is such that those who are there for services have easy access to the chapel as well as the crematorium, entailing only a walk into a hallway.  An adjacent viewing room enables observation of the space in which the retort is visible.  



Tuesday, April 2, 2013

CREMATION REEFS

Fly'Bye Lady Visit In FLORIDA

SARASOTA

The landscape of the Reef Innovations construction site is saturated with an abundance of reef structures.  Some of many in the outdoor lot were made for the Eternal Reefs enterprise, specifically designed to incorporate cremated remains destined for final disposition in the sea.  One in particular evoked poignancy.  Members of a boat club had prepared it for a beloved captain who had recently died. After her remains were mixed into the round ball situated in the bottom, they implanted trinkets representative of her life in the circular top ring of concrete.  A round bronze plate embedded in the exterior identifies the woman along with pertinent dates and a maritime symbol... in this case, a boat.  A memorial cruise to her final resting place was planned for the following weekend at which time the reef would be dropped in the water and club members would meaningfully declare their goodbyes. 



On the premises of the infamous downtown marina anchored by the Marina Jack restaurant is a small beachfront.  This is where families and friends of decedents may choose to gather when a memorial reef provided by the Great Burial Reef company is deployed by them to a location three miles off the coast.