Nine folks gathered at my home in Seattle for a relaxing afternoon to talk frankly.  After the first half-hour, when we'd all been introduced and chatted about why each of us wanted to talk about death and dying, we heard a squawk in the kitchen. 

Into the living room came one of my cats with a live robin in her mouth.  She saw all the people and dashed into the bedroom (of course).  I said, "Excuse me, or I think we're going to come really close to having a death AT our DeathCafe!"  Another woman and I tossed a towel over the bird, locked the cat in the room and freed the bird outside, which flew away swiftly. 

The rest of the afternoon we talked about our experiences with loved ones' dying and death, the planning that we still need to do, and shared some learnings, books, films and resources.  Two of our group had had death experiences where they watched the "scene" of their dying from above, then "came back" and rejoined the living.

We all felt it was a successful afternoon, especially since we didn't have to bury a bird in the backyard after our delicious limoncello cake.