From Dickens’ A Christmas Carol again, Scrooge shown his end by the ghost of Christmas future. My mother – who, with my father, has an inordinate love for comparing and critiquing film adaptations of this story – always used this line of work meetings and conferences:
“It’s likely to be a very cheap funeral,” said the same speaker; “for upon my life I don’t know of anybody to go to it. Suppose we make up a party and volunteer?”
“I don’t mind going if a lunch is provided,” observed the gentleman with the excrescence on his nose. “But I must be fed, if I make one.”
Extracts 