I held the money that was supposed to pay for my grandfather's funeral years ago. I prepaid his funeral, but the funeral director and I both forgot to make an allowance for having his name engraved into the tombstone that was already in place. My sister had threatened to sue me over the fact that I had the money, so I told her to get her free consultation from a lawyer, and that I guaranteed that she would pay more in legal fees than she could recover from me. I had all the receipts and bank statements, and it turned out that she wanted the money to buy another sister a car.

I didn't discover the omission until a few months after my grandfather's funeral and had sent enough receipts to remove any doubt that I had spent the money ONLY on funeral expenses with the disbursal of the few hundred dollars that each of my sisters got. It was my mistake, so I was willing to pay for the engraving. I needed the deed to the plot, which my father was supposed to have. He denied having it. I called the cemetery, and they told me that if I got a notarized letter stating that I have the authority to have the engraving done, and paid a fee of about $85, they would have the work done. I got the letter, took it to the cemetery with a check for $85 and the engraving was done within a month.

Learning this was useful about 20 years later when my youngest sister died, and my lawsuit-happy sister wanted her buried in my parents's plot. She didn't have the deed to my parents's plot either, even though Dad had died only 5 years previously, and Mom had died over 20 years ago. More paperwork, and we were able to bury her ashes in my parents's plot.

Funerals bring out the worst in family members.