It could always be worse

[sniffles]

Last night I was watching a program on Discovery (or maybe it was the History Channel, I'm not sure) about an examination of an Egyptian mummy. The mummy was that of a high-ranking priest. Rather than tear apart his wrappings to examine him, the researchers put him through a CT scan. They had noticed in a previous x-ray that there was an odd object on top of his head. In the CT scan they determined that the object was a small clay bowl. Why did the priest have a bowl on his head? The researchers theorized that the embalmers had placed the bowl under his head to catch excess resin during the mummification process. But the resin solidified faster than they expected, and when they returned they found the bowl stuck to the priest's head. The scalp showed some damage which the researchers suspected had been caused by the embalmers attempting to remove the bowl.

So it could always be worse - that poor priest, once a fanbearer to the pharaoh, had to go to the afterlife with a bowl stuck to his head!