Friday, September 22, 2006

Playing with fire

Bees actually, but what's worse - gett'in burned or getting attacked by yellow jackets?
Invited my friend Bill over for some expert advice on landscaping my front disaster of a lawn. Riding every weekend during the summer doesn"t help weed the planting beds nor does it leave time to prune overgrown rhododendrons.
Could have just left well enough alone but feel responsible not to bring the property values down in my part of suburbia. Billy gave Lesli some great ideas. #1 rip out the big-old ugly ass bushes on either side of the ranch. Gave me an excuse to use the willys and a cable to extract the root-ball after cutting down the yews. Wish the damn cable didn't break and shoot like a metal whip at the tail gate of my antique suv, my fault. I'm over the carnage, what's a little paint any how? five years ago it would have been a big deal.
After a couple cold ones I'm removing cement blocks that were half burried and entangled in weeds and grass and wham! wham! wham! I'm getting stung in the face, ear, and side of the neck. Took a sec. to figure out what's happening. Never saw the little f**kers but heard 'em. My neighbor (Mary) had just stepped out for her car to the sight of me dancing round the lawn swearing like the father in "a Christmas story". - what the...Rack n frak, u little sons a... ahhgh!! all the while swatting at the buzzing pests with a shovel. real nice. Should have taken Harvey's advice and went for a ride.
So that was yesterday.. This is today. I'm not giving up, put my head down and drive thru this project bees or no bees.
Forgot all about yesterdays pain and went right back at it. Shoveling loads of dirt and weeds into my wheelbarrow and then, Buzzzzz buz buzzz. Swarming in a flying mass of yellow and black above a bush. After a minute they returned to their borrow. I went to the garage and grabbed a can of Raid. "Sorry guys", as I soaked the area with poison. No more bees..went back to work removing cement blocks. Every now and they looking at their hole, nothing...that was easy.
10 minutes later I disturb their underground nest again but this time the motherload emerge. Dom and Gus (my dogs) can't identify the danger quick enough and are coated with stinging bees. Poor Dom was hit bad. The yellow jackets stick to his long hair like velcro, they burrow in for the kill. I swatted 20 or 30 off his long black coat but he was getting wailed. I look over to Gus, he is dragging his face on the ground trying to rub out the pain after being bit several times on the snout.
This is war. Tomorrow I hit up the hardware store for a bee bomb.

3 comments:

Jason said...

Dear God! Poor dogs.

I've been trying to catch up on my disaster of a yard too. ripping out EVERYTHING, start new next year.

good luck with da'bomb

jm

jeff said...

DROP THE BOMB ON THEIR ASSES!

wraith said...

I think you'll have better luck going at it once more. Think of it as the 98th mile of a century.. climb in the pain cave feel the burn and get er done.