You've probably heard of the hypochondriac's epitaph: 'I told you I was sick!"

And the aggressive character who had on his:

"Waddya think you're lookin' at!"

And where the epitaph poet imposed his wish on the deceased:

"Underneath this pile of stones Lie the remains of Billy Jones. His name was really Smith, not Jones, But I chose Jones to rhyme with stones."

Which leads me to the story of the pope's death, after which he discovered, as he stood in the line outside the pearly gates, that a lawyer had died a moment ahead of him.

As he caught Peter's attention, Peter looked up and raced up towards him with his arms open wide, grinning broadly. As the pope freed his arms to respond, Peter stopped and embraced the lawyer; and pulling out of the line he escorted him through the gates and took almost forever to show him over an absolute palace that was just inside Paradise. Finally he re-emerged and paused at the gate to call back into the mansion: "Now if there's anything else you need, call and I deal with it personally!"

The pope was thinking: "If he did all that for a lawyer, how much more can I look forward to?"

The line slowly shuffled forward until the pope was at the desk, where he heard Peter say - without looking up - "If you take the second laneway to the left, the twelfth hut on the left is yours."

"But I'm the pope. How do you justify a hut for me when did did all that for a crummy lawyer?"

Peter replied: "We've got hundreds of popes. This is our first lawyer!"