From a friend in Australia shared by Peggy: The government offered the Irwin family a State Funeral for Steve. To-day the Irwin family refused the offer, preferring instead to have a quiet ptrivate funeral with only family and close friends in attendance. I think that is understandable. They are going to hold a Public Memorial service at a date, time and place still to be announced but it is to be held sometime in the next two weeks. I doubt that any of our large venues would hold the number of people who would attend. There could be hundreds of thousands wishing to be there. Outside Australia Zoo there are massive banks of flowers and other tributes and throngs of people. Apparently some days the whole lower carpark is filled with people offering tributes. Australia has never seen anything like it. But then I guess he was one of a kind. ============================================================================ POST is Copyrighted 2006. All material remains the property of the original author and of GSD Communication, Inc. NO REPRODUCTIONS or FORWARDS of any kind are permitted without prior permission of the original author AND of the Showgsd-l Management. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. ALL PERSONS ARE ON NOTICE THAT THE FORWARDING, REPRODUCTION OR USE IN ANY MANNER OF ANY MATERIAL WHICH APPEARS ON SHOWGSD-L WITHOUT THE EXPRESS PERMISSION OF ALL PARTIES TO THE POST AND THE LIST MANAGEMENT IS EXPRESSLY FORBIDDEN, AND IS A VIOLATION OF LAW. VIOLATORS OF THIS PROHIBITION WILL BE PROSECUTED. For assistance, please contact the List Management at admin@xxxxxxxxxxxx VISIT OUR WEBSITE - URL temporarily deleted due to AOL issues ============================================================================