Nemesis

When I was about 8 years old I was stung by a bee while I was asleep in my bed...in the armpit. It got horribly infected and caused me all sorts of pain. In order to help me feel better, my mom used to sit with me and read all of the information about bees/wasps/yellow jackets out of our 1977 Encyclopedia Britanica. My one condolence was the hope that it was a bee that had stung me and therefore had given his life to do so.

When I was about 10 a bee/wasp got me on my ankle while I was playing on my Grandparents teeter-totter in their back yard. I was minding my own business and everything. We then headed up the mountain to Snowbird and I remember being awake that night in the hotel hating bees with all my 10 year old heart.

When I was 15 I went boating with some friends in a nearby reservoir. I jumped off the boat to go up to the picnic area without my shoes and...you guessed it...I stepped on a bee. I think he was even dead, but the bugger got me anyway...right in between my toes. That one got really infected as well, to the point where you couldn't tell which toes the sting had occured between because it was all so red and swollen.

As you can see, I do not have a great history with bees, so when I found the huge nest the wasps had built under our gable roof I was a little intimidated. My sister Joanne saw it as well and advised me to wait until dusk to kill it. Apparently the bees are at their calmest at this point in the day and they are all back at home, allowing the greatest number of the little buzzing beasts to be killed.

On this particular evening, Matt was out mountain biking and so I could not defer to him to be the in-house pest killer. So, I herded all of the kids inside, made sure our patio door was unlocked (so that I could make my quick escape inside), and I got out my can of wasp killer. This wasp killer is the kind that shoots up to 20+ feet away. Anyway, with my heart pounding in my chest, I did a test run to make sure that the can really worked correctly and then I aimed and fired. Wow, that stuff works great!!! The 20+ wasps on the nest immediately started to fall dead to the ground. After emptying a quarter of the can on them, I decided I had done my job really well...and I wasn't even going to have to run for it.


Here is the mega nest and the remaining dead wasps that got stuck onto it as I sprayed them.

Just at that moment, I noticed a renegade wasp come swooping down on me. I tried to swat him away with my hand, but...you guessed it...he STUNG me! Aaii yai yai! Those stings hurt bad. I (rather quickly) made my escape to the aforementioned patio door...silently cursing the entire breed of my nemesis. I got on the computer and looked up what to do for a bee sting and discoved the best thing was to
1. Scrape the stinger out with a credit card
2. Wash the site thoroughly with soap and water
3. Apply ice for swelling and pain
4. Apply some type of antibiotic ointment
5. Take ibuprofen for pain

So, I fished out my handy credit card and scraped away. It hurt like crazy, but I hoped it would help. I then washed my hands with soap and cold water and already the burning sensation started to subside. I decided that the scraping had removed the stinger and so I didn't feel like I needed the ibuprofen and to be perfectly honest, I completely forgot about the Neosporin.

Mostly, the whole event just made me angry. Angry at the nasty little beasts (which are very fast and vindictive...now I know why people use the term bee-line), angry at myself for not spraying and running (which was my original plan), and angry that my hand now hurt.

In the end though, I had killed them, and I had done it on my own. Lesson learned...right? I had even decided that the sting was mostly my own fault and the wasp was just trying to protect his family. I mean, how would I like it if a huge creature came and doused my home with poison?


Fast forward to two days later. I woke up this morning and unconsciously scratched my hand. OWWWEEEE! What was that?!? I looked down at my old bee sting and realized why step number 4 was so important and should not be forgotten. Yep. My hand is infected. It isn't too terrible (not like the armpit or in between the toes) and I know my immune system will fight it off, but man oh man, I really do not like wasps!

So much for me feeling bad about destroying his home.