Posted on 01/25/2003 4:43:32 PM PST by MadIvan
A Sicilian man who had been pronounced dead by doctors startled relatives by sitting up just before he was to be put into his coffin and demanding a glass of water.
Minutes later 79-year-old Roberto De Simone, from Palermo, was rushed back to the Vincenzo Cervello hospital in the Sicilian capital, where 12 hours earlier doctors said he had died.
His wife and children, who had been praying over what they believed to be his corpse, declared his recovery to be a miracle. Hospital staff admit that they are baffled by his revival.
Mr De Simone himself was more enigmatic. "Old Uncle Giuseppe hasn't got me yet. Both he and paradise can wait," he is said to have declared in a quavering voice on his re-admission to hospital.
A family friend told The Telegraph that the comment was a reference to a late relation with whom Mr De Simone had never been on good terms. It was customary in Sicily, the friend said, for people to talk of the day they would die as being "taken by the Lord - but in Roberto's case, he was over the moon to find that he had not been taken by his eternal enemy, Uncle Giuseppe".
Details of the retired council employee's remarkable recovery were last week gripping locals who have an irresistible fascination with the afterlife.
Relatives said that after feeling unwell at his home in Palermo, Mr De Simone had been taken to the hospital the previous week. There he suffered a serious heart attack.
Doctors managed to restart his heart with an adrenaline injection but Donald Trozzi, his son-in-law, a policeman from Pescara, in mainland Italy, said: "At 3.30am, the doctors told us that my father-in-law had entered a coma and that later there had been brain death."
In an effort to spare the grieving family members the usual red tape that follows deaths in Italian hospitals, doctors arranged for Mr De Simone - whose heart was still beating - to be discharged as if he were still alive. He was sent home in an ambulance.
There, his body was laid out on a bed, the undertaker was sent for and his Sunday best was being readied to dress him for his coffin. As his daughters Rosaria and Anna sat with other friends and relations weeping over his corpse, the nearly-departed Mr De Simone opened his eyes and in a plaintive voice said: "I'd like some water, please. You know, I'm awfully thirsty."
The women cried that it was a miracle and Mr De Simone was rushed back to the hospital, where he is now recovering from "serious respiratory problems".
The family friend told The Telegraph: "The family is understandably very tired and feeling fragile, and have asked to be left in peace."
May he live to be 110!
Oh Gosh that would have freaked me out .. *L*
An old e-mail purporting to explain the origin of common phrases. Note another poster with a similar reply and the other common meaing for the expression.
Carolyn
He would place them in a coffin and nail it shut.
The hammering would wake them up... then they heard the “Last Words”. HA!
He looked kinda goofy, but the priest let him go up the belltower, says, "Show me what you can do." The guy backs up to the wall, takes a running start, jumps up and rings one of the bells with his head. Sounds great. "Are you O.K.?" "Yeah, this is the way I always do it." "I don't believe it." Guy takes another run at the bell, misses, sails out of the window and down to the street below.
A crowd gathers. As the priest runs down the stairs and out into the street, the policeman comes up. He looks at the priest and says, "Did you know this man?"
Priest says, "Officer, I don't know his name, but his face rings a bell."
Part II:
Another guy shows up to answer the ad. He says he's the brother of the other guy and he's determined to retrieve the family honor. After much reluctance, the priest lets him try. Same stupid method, same result. Guy sails out the window and down to the square. A crowd gathers. Policeman asks the same question, and the priest replies,
. . . .. drum roll please . . . .
"I don't know his name, but he's a dead ringer for his brother."
bada bing.
Anybody know it?
Zat zounds rrrrreasonable to mee!
Seriously though...I have a question since you seem to have a handle on the meaning of obscure axioms.
Do you know the source of "The whole nine yards"?
I want to believe that it refers to a man's wardrobe where it was customary to be fitted for a jacket, vest and 2 pairs of slacks...requiring approximately nine yards of material. (i.e. "Give me the whole nine yards!")
I've been told there's another meaning but I just don't buy it.
This is where the term "working the grave shift" came from. They did it to see if this exact thing would happen, and sometimes did, as in this case.
Cecil, What's the Origin of "The Whole Nine Yards"?
BTW, some folks (including my ggg grandfather) requested in their wills that a major vein be opened before they were buried, so that everybody was SURE they were dead. (Hope somebody read their wills some time before they were planted! Maybe that was the custom then. . . )
The attribution I've heard for "the whole nine yards" relates to the length of belt-fed ammo loaded onto a fighter aircraft. It was 27 feet in length. A pilot that expended his entire supply of ammo used "the whole nine yards".
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