Even though it sounds like a National Enquirer story, this one was found by the Reuters news service, and relayed to me by a reader
Woman a No-Show at Her Own Funeral
NICOSIA (Reuters) - The grave was dug, the hearse hired and the mourners assembled but an 85-year-old Cypriot woman spoiled plans for her funeral by coming back from the dead.
Newspapers reported Friday that Evdokia Petrou was pronounced dead at a nursing home in the town of Paphos on the island of Cyprus Thursday before sharp-eyed doctors at a local hospital found that she had only slipped into a coma. But relatives had heard the exaggerated report of her demise and made plans for her funeral, even calling family members living abroad to come home for the sad event. "I was told she was dying so I went to get a priest for the last rites," said her son, Rolandos Kyriakou. "When I returned employees at the nursing home told me she had just died. They lifted up her limp wrist to show no pulse," he said.
Petrou was recovering in an intensive care ward.
"I don't know whether to laugh or cry," Kyriakou said.
I guess that explains all those scratch marks on the insides of coffins over there...