Are you unhappily married ever after? Well, for those couples who are undergoing the often-painful process of divorce, here a one small way to bury your past: A tiny "coffin" to lay to rest your now-useless wedding rings.
"Give a dead marriage its proper, final resting place," says the company offering the miniature caskets, Jist Enterprises, on its Web site.
"The Wedding Ring Coffin is the perfect gift for yourself or a loved one for bringing closure after a divorce," the company continues. "It's time to bury the past and move on to a new tomorrow."
The $29.95 coffin, measuring 6 inches long, 2 inches high and 2 inches wide, is made of solid wood and has a dark glossy mahogany finish. The interior is lined with black velvet and the casket comes with a split lid for either an open or closed casket, for those who want to hold a public viewing of their marital failures.
We hope they will next sell a coffin so you can also bury the legal bills.
Not-so-bad ideas
- Unless you've just been released from a long stay in solitary confinement at a maximum-security prison, there's not even a small chance you haven't heard of Sanjaya Malakar, one of the remaining finalists on American Idol, better known for his wacky hairstyles and hysterical tween fans rather than his singing talents. (Although his performance this week was "not horrible," according to perpetual crank/judge Simon Cowell.)
So it was probably inevitable that Corporate America now wants to horn in in on the Sanjaya mania. Fast-food chain Kentucky Fried Chicken says it has proposed that if the Idol wannabe performs on the TV show wearing a "bowl" haircut (think Moe from the Three Stooges), it will bestow Sanjaya with a lifetime supply of KFC's Famous Bowls meals, $5,000 — and here's the best part — the opportunity to appear in a KFC commercial.We think Sanjaya should not sell himself short. Dude, hold out for unlimited cole slaw at least.
- Literature lovers now have a new vacation destination: A Charles Dickens theme park complete with a Great Expectations boat ride and Ye Olde Curiosity Gift Shop.
But Dickens World, a $123 million complex built in the naval dockyard where the Victorian author's father once worked as a clerk, is confidently predicting 300,000 visitors a year."We are not Disneyfying Dickens," insisted manager Ross Hutchins."If Dickens was alive today, he would probably have built the place himself, " Hutchins said of the theme park in Chatham, once an area of high unemployment after the dockyards closed in the 1980s, but now is part of a major revitalization project.Some critics may have been scornful of the project in the lead-up to its opening on April 20.But Hutchins insists the attraction — featuring a dark, dirty and dank London populated by thieves, murderers and ghosts — has the air of authenticity as it was built in consultation with experts from the Dickens Fellowship.But he is the first to recognize Dickens still has a lot of catching up to do with Shakespeare in literary popularity."If you asked many people today under 30 to name five Dickens novels, they probably couldn't. We are going to bring Dickens to life," he promised.Maybe they should market the the theme park with ads featuring poor orphans and the tagline: "Please sir, may we ride another?"