I should know better

Almost immobilised as a result of an eye operation and warned that if I do anything, lift anything, bend down, I will damage the eye, I feel very confined and limited at the moment.   Obviously no shows this weekend.  And just try to live a normal life – with puppies!- without bending down.   I suppose I am pushing the limits, but as yet the eye is still there.

Autumn is sweeping in, and usually at this time of year I am on wasp watch, but this year there aren`t many, thank goodness.   Not that they trouble me, but with dogs they are a danger.   But this time I can`t locate any nests.

My usual technique for dealing with them is fairly spectacular.  It involves a bottle of white spirit and a cane with a candle fixed to the end.   I locate the nest, which here is usually underground, and wait till twilight, when the wasps return for the night.   Then I pour in the white spirit, light it, and s they say on the firework box “retire immediately”.

This method is not foolproof.   Using it, I have discovered that conifers transform into torches in seconds, and that putting out grassfires is a slow and dirty business.  It does for the wasps, though.

For a wasp nest indoors, obviously the above method is not recommended.   If. as usual, the nest is hanging above, I would suggest the Two Idiots method.   This involves one machete, one dustbin with a tight fitting lid, one ladder, and two men with more machismo than sense.  None of these items is too hard to find….the machete is probably the most difficult.

Idiot one climbs the ladder and stands on it beside the wasp nest with the machete.   Idiot two stands below with the dustbin open.  Then comes the action –   Idiot one slashes the nest free of the roof, and Idiot two neatly catches it in the bin and slams the lid on. 

I don`t need to tell you of the many possible outcomes of this manoeuvre.  Chaplin, or Buster Keaton, could have made much of it.  The least troublesome is that Idiot one falls off the ladder….the one that doesn`t bear thinking about is that the wasps miss the dustbin altogether.    I suppose there is the remote possibility that Idiot one cuts his own arm off – remember, we are not dealing with intelligent people here.   Intelligent people ran a mile when the wasp nest was first discovered.

Speaking of which, I remember one particularly wasp-plagued summer when Old Peter, my neighbour was busy having his fruit harvest packed in the fruit shed.  Suddenly two shots were fired.  I ran out to see women running in all directions, screaming.  Thinking murder, i ran up to see – and ran straight into a swarm of demented and rather smoky wasps.   What had happened?

“Aye well, said Peter, “we`re behind with this fruit as it is, and then we saw the wasp bike hanging from the roof and the women said they wouldn`t work in there.   So I sorta lost my temper and just gave it both barrels of the twelve-bore…”

This method is absolutely not recommended.

Unless you are Quentin Tarantino making a film….