For the majority of us, death is a sad event that ushers in months of mourning.
Others, however, take a more lighthearted approach to the inevitable.
You can choose to go the route of bumming everyone out about what they've lost with
your departure from this world, or you could find a way to leave everyone you love with
one last laugh.
"Goodnight, sweet prince."
Obituaries usually list a person's achievements with some sort of noble approach that skirts
over your less fine moments.
But they're usually not very fun to read for anyone outside of the deceased's inner circle,
and even those people are probably just scanning to make sure they got a mention in the thing
anyway.
Every once in awhile, though, people with one foot in the grave manage to put together
something inspired before they kick that bucket.
"I want to be buried at sea.
It looks like fun!"
"Define 'fun.'"
"C'mon, you'll make a day of it."
Let's take a look at some of the most hilarious obituaries we've ever read.
One last confession
As he wrote in his own obituary for the Salt Lake Tribune, Val Paterson's life motto was
"Anything for a laugh."
And that includes posthumous confessions of crimes no one ever needed to know about.
Turns out, Patterson was a downright thief -- only his ploys weren't all about diamonds
or rare paintings.
He wrote, "As it turns out, I AM the guy who stole the safe from the Motor View Drive Inn
back in June, 1971.
I could have left that unsaid, but I wanted to get it off my chest.
Also, I really am NOT a Ph.D." In fact, Mr. Patterson never actually graduated college.
Instead, it was a clerical error which awarded him with not only a college diploma, but an
unearned Ph.D.
Kinda makes you wonder about all the fake nerds lurking around the world, doesn't it?
"Now that you point it out…"
"Are you kidding me?"
Oh, and that's not all.
Just to spite a "mean park ranger," the man once rolled rocks on top of a geyser to be
a jerk and managed to get banned from both Disneyland and SeaWorld.
Now, that's a life story worth reading about.
Now we're just sad 'cause he's not around to tell us more.
The coffin quarterback
Ohio native Scott E. Entsminger spent his life cheering for the Cleveland Browns, and
like many of his fellow fans, he has enjoyed a lot of disappointment as a result of that
allegiance.
"Just saying it out loud feels dirty."
So when he was nearing the red zone in his own time on the field, he decided to pull
out a trick play against his own squad.
Before Entsminger's death in 2013, the Browns had endured a solid losing streak for decades,
with one random good season plopped in every 7 years or so.
So, this man's final wish was to have six players from the Cleveland Browns act as pallbearers
for him on the day of his funeral, so, in his words "the Browns [could] let him down
one last time."
That deserves a targeting penalty for sure.
Of course, the Browns did their worst to shame him right back by offering his widow a lousy
jersey for all their troubles.
The Joker
There are few people who have had the privilege of playing the role of Batman, but how many
real people are known to have been killed by Batman?
For one, there's Stephen Merrill.
His obituary lists cause of death as an uppercut from Batman.
First of all, if this were true, we'd imagine he'd be totally okay with it, as he was apparently
a huge fan of America's beloved fictional superheroes.
That detail was really just some stand-in information that his friends and family provided
because they initially didn't know what the cause of death was, but what a way to go.
"Don't get worried about that!
Your tombstone can say whatever you want it to say.
It could say, 'Ross Geller: Good at marriage.'"
Mine's gonna say "Phoebe Buffay: buried alive."
Not only did those he left behind color in his obituary by throwing in Batman, but they
carried on the theme to the funeral service.
Those who attended wore superhero tees, played soundtracks from his favorite superhero movies,
and even provided him with a flower arrangement made to look like Captain America's shield.
If you want to die the cool way, you've got Stephen Merrill to look for for inspiration.
Keeping it simple
If there were a prize for the most economic use of an obituary word count, Fargo, North
Dakota native Doug Legler would definitely win it.
"Umm, he just, he came up with it and said all I want is, 'Doug died.'"
That is it.
That is literally all that this man wanted in his obituary.
So why go to the trouble of having two words printed at all?
It seems that during his lifetime, Doug had a habit of reading obituaries in the paper.
He also had a habit of criticizing each and every obit he read.
Since he was a man so concerned about the obituaries of strangers during his lifetime,
he wanted to give no one the ability to judge him after death.
"That's a genius move."
"Thank you."
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