I'm sad to see Poppy go; he was an oddball, and a lot of fun. Likewise, Dilf was fond of him, and will regret making one less gin and tonic at family functions.

Poppy didn't raise Dilf -- Dilf was living on his own when his mom began dating Poppy, let alone married him. And I only met Poppy about 9 years ago. For all of those 9 years, Poppy was weathering one health crisis or another. He smoked lots, drank lots, ate copious amounts of red meat and fried items of one sort of another, and didn't exercise at all. He had already had a quadruple bypass by the time I met first him, as he was sitting down to a dinner of two pan-fried T-bone steaks.

Thus, all of us, including Dilf's mom, were fully prepared for this sad event. In fact, we had several dry runs as practice. Despite all the earlier scares and drama, Poppy died peacefully in bed during his afternoon nap.

While the adults have accepted the sad reality that Poppy's time had come, I was worried about the little Übers' reaction. They adored Poppy as much as he adored them. But it seems that God (yes, I believe in Him! I don't feel like arguing about it right now) protects their little hearts from too much grief.

I told them that Poppy's body had stopped working the night before, so his soul had to go back up to God. I explained we wouldn't be seeing him any more, at least on this planet.

Younger simply said, "Poor Poppy." Elder said, "Well, he was fun while he lasted."

"He was fun while he lasted" has become Poppy's epitheth. It gave my mother-in-law great comfort, and pretty succinctly summed up his life.