When I let the dog out for his morning visit to the green-carpeted w.c., it was unusually cool. (In St. Louis, this means temperatures less than 90F and humidity below 80% at 9am.) Suddenly any other plans were out the window. My deck! I’ll work on my deck! (Yes, still.)

Dragged some nasty clothes on, grabbed the sanders, my cigs and my tape player, and headed out. Set up the tape player so Mesh STL was rockin’, plugged in the sander, and then stood very still.

Two feet from where I was standing - a mere foot from the tape player - several honey bees were buzzing, flying steadily into and out of an old box. The box had been sitting patiently on my carport since I moved into the house (in 2000). It contains eight place-settings of Pfaltzgraff dinnerware that I don’t use anymore. I merely gained custody of it in the divorce.

The box is so old that it doesn’t close tightly anymore. The two-inch gap between top flaps was apparently all that was needed for the honey bees. They’d found a new home.

I edged backward a bit, watching them. It was impossible to gauge their numbers. Then I looked at the sky. It was still beautiful. The breeze was still cool. And these damned bees weren’t going to ruin it for me.

After a bit of hunting, I discovered a box that had been flattened out. It seemed to be larger than the box with the dishes, so I very carefully snuck over and threw it on top.

At the time, the logic was there: trap them inside, and the ones who can’t get inside will go away. Right?

(Of course, this is also the logic of someone who is terrified by honey bees, and suddenly confronted with them. By herself.)

The end result of this mad logic was a furious swarm of honey bees all hovering above the box, with the occasional pest beat itself against the top of it. I backed into my house with my palms sweating.

I could hear Mesh STL blaring outside, but the tape player was just a foot above the mouth of the box, and I’d be damned if I would shut it off at this point. I pulled on shoes and a ball cap and resigned myself to an emergency trip to Home Depot. As my paychecks were already being direct-deposited there due to the deck project and the swingset project, what the hell did this matter?

All in all, the story ends rather well. I wasn’t injured. (This is good.) All the bees died. (This is also good.) And I only spent $3.97. (This is very good.) The moral of the story is: clean your damned house!

But I’m still too afraid to go near the box.

Voracious Wildlife Killer,

michelle