[davemac]

We expect things to go smoothly at a funeral, and for the most part it does, even when it does go slightly awry the mourners don't see the problem. In my time in charge I witnessed a few slight deviations from the norm, leaving the funeral home without the coffin, a funeral director nipping home whilst the service was being undertaken, this give a 20 minute window, trouble was he sat in the chair at home and fell asleep. One incident that still makes me smile, but only after the event, was a day when no burials or cremations were booked, this gives a clear day for external maintenance of the grounds. So everyone was togged up for weeding digging and other dirty jobs, myself included. It was a nice sunny day and we were getting stuck into cleaning the area around the outside of the crem. Suddenly through the main gates entered a hearse, nothing unusual as it could have been going to the office with paperwork, however it was followed by the limousine containing the family, then the rest of the family in their own cars. At this point a part of my body tightened, as we knew we had nothing booked for that day, but here was a funeral cortege heading down the hill for the crematorium, and nothing had been prepared and we were stood there with spades, rakes and forks at the crematorium entrance like an honor guard for a gardeners funeral. We could do nothing but watch it slowly proceed down the drive and contemplate what was about to happen when it arrived at the large glass doors, I did consider early retirement at this point. Slowly, so very slowly it headed in our direction and all we could do was wait by the doors, and arrive by the doors it did, the driver of the hearse gave us a look of panic, he then kept driving followed by the rest of the funeral cortege, he drove to the end of the drive and took a right turn up the exit drive and exited the cemetery. At this point he turned left and headed for Burnley Crematorium, the muffin had arrived at the wrong cemetery, some days later we had the driver arrive at the crem when he should have been there, his excuse was he was heading up Burnley Road and took a left turn automatically without thinking, having done so he had no alternative but to carry on down the drive as the rest of the family had followed him in.