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Beginning at the end

Wedding photo of Asian couple in a coffin.
Couple celebrate their wedding in the family funeral home.

We look forward to the day when an especially weird couple chooses to tie the knot at the Museum of the Weird. (We can totally make that happen with an in-house officiant!)

However, until that happy day, we always like to look at the bizarre ways that people celebrate their unions. Earlier this month, a couple in Ohio had their wedding in her family funeral home. According to this article in The Huffington Post, Chelsea and Barry Lesnick exchanged vows at the Brunner Sanden Deitrick Funeral Home & Cremation Center which has been run by her family for years.

“We really didn’t think of it as weird, for our mindset, because we deal with death all the time. It’s the family business,” Chelsea told Huffington. “But talking to other people about it, like friends and Barry’s family, they were a little weirded out by the idea. They were a little skeptical, thinking, ‘How is this going to work? Are there going to be dead bodies everywhere?'”

Having made the acquaintance of a lovely Austin funeral director, I have seen her approach funerals as a celebration of life. That would make it a very fitting place for a wedding.

Of course, there are those who take a darker view. An Austin cake maker, Natalie Sideserf, created a most unusual cake for her marriage to husband, David. Being horror fans, they celebrated with cakes depicting their own severed heads. See this video.

 

https://youtu.be/bCoSS1YgDqo

Isn’t it wonderful when weird people find each other? Weird weddings are proof that a couple belongs together, with a celebration as unique as they are. We raise a toast to all of you lucky couples. Of course, if you are looking for a perfect way to start your weird life together, we always have some room to celebrate amongst the mummies and shrunken heads.

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Monuments of bone

Humans have a fascination with the remains of our ancestors. There are many examples in the Museum of ways that artifacts have been preserved for religious, magical, and historical purposes. Some of our items have come with a little extra, such us Emily, the skeleton which arrived with a ghost who haunts the Museum.

Of course, by some standards our collection is ridiculously tame. Here is a fascinating panoramic view of a bizarre chapel in Czermna, Poland, constructed with human skulls and bones. Move your mouse around in the picture to look all around.

You can read more about this fascinating monument in this article from the Smithsonian Institute.

There is also the Seldec Ossuary, also known as “the Kutna Hora bone church.” This video tour shows how human bones have been used to create chandeliers and other things in the monastery.

Are these the vestiges of superstition, throwbacks to a time when we looked for souls in a sneeze? Are they respect for the vast number of lives who have come before us? Are they just weird art?

Come to the Museum of the Weird and experience our mummies, skeletal items, and other bizarre examples of how people have kept the dead near by. See some other examples of bone monuments in this article by Mental Floss.

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MAN BEATS WOMAN WITH FROZEN ARMADILLO

An armadillo.

Folks, we couldn’t make these stories up if we tried.

 

DALLAS – A man used a frozen armadillo to attack a 57-year old Pleasant Grove woman, Dallas police said.

The incident happened on Sept. 29 in an apartment complex parking lot.

According to investigators, the altercation occurred when the suspect was selling the carcass to the victim, who planned to eat the animal.

The pair apparently began arguing over the price of the item when the man twice threw the armadillo at the woman.

The animal first struck the woman in the leg and then in her chest.

She was reportedly bruised by the attack.

Detectives have been unable to find the man, who could face assault charges.

Source:  http://www.myfoxdfw.com/dpp/news/unusual/101811-Man-Allegedly-Beat-Woman-with-Frozen-Armadillo#ixzz1bLydV2CG