It’s the hottest ticket in town: Frozen Dead Guy Days, a wild and wacky celebration of all things dead and frozen, gets underway in Nederland Colorado March 4-6, 2011. And if you attend, you can come play “The Newly-Dead Game” with me!
The event features coffin races, a parade of hearses, a Polar Plunge, the Brain Freeze Ball, frozen turkey bowling and salmon tossing, a frozen T-shirt contest, and new this year, “The Newly-Dead Game.”
“The Newly-Dead Game,” conducted by Gail Rubin, “The Doyenne of Death,” tests how well a couple knows each other, just like the popular TV game show “The Newlywed Game.” At Frozen Dead Guy Days, “The Newly-Dead Game” will test how well life partners know each other’s last wishes.
Frozen Dead Guy Days (FDGD) is based on the true story of Grandpa Bredo Morstoel from Norway. After his death due to a heart condition in 1989, his daughter Aud and grandson Trygve packed him in dry ice and shipped him to a U.S. cryonics facility for eventual reanimation. In 1993, Aud and Trygve, hoping to start their own cryonic facility, moved Grandpa to Colorado.
Then the story takes a number of interesting turns. Long story short – Grandpa Bredo has been kept in a Tuff Shed-sheltered, dry ice-fueled deep freeze in Nederland ever since. [Read the full story here.]
This will be the 10th annual FDGD festival coordinated by the Nederland Area Chamber of Commerce. Reader’s Digest named Frozen Dead Guy Days one of the top five winter festivals in the country, and won the Governor’s Award for Best Promotional Event in Colorado in 2010. This year’s slogan is Freeze The Day!
Gail Rubin authored A Good Goodbye: Funeral Planning for Those Who Don’t Plan to Die and writes The Family Plot Blog. She welcomes volunteers to sign up in advance to play “The Newly-Dead Game” by contacting her through her website, www.AGoodGoodbye.com.
A big thanks to the nonprofit organization Engage With Grace for sponsoring “The Newly-Dead Game” and Gail’s talks. For the five questions that might save your life – or end it… www.EngageWithGrace.org.