Ah Spring, Why Must You?

I've been sitting here in my just-out-of-bed stupor, reading emails, checking out new blog posts, and watching funny videos. There has been a background noise that I've been hearing, but not hearing, if you know what I mean. After another late night where sleep wouldn't come on it's own, I woke up sluggish and groggy. And in this state, that noise didn't register with me. It was a vibrating noise, a buzzing, familiar noise. Fifteen minutes of this and it dawned on me that I knew why the sound was familiar. It was a wasp trapped between the blinds and the window. I hate wasps, their bugged out blank eyes and their limp, hanging legs as they hover. And of course, the evil stinger, curling and flicking as it warns of its power.

This hideous thing was inside the room, in the window next to me. I wanted to shut the door and leave it for Hubby, but I need to be in this room right now. So I took a deep breath and reached for my big girl panties. But big girl panties wouldn't fit over my tennis shoes and jeans, or kill a wasp, so I reached for a fly swatter. Carefully, I pulled the cord, raising the blinds until I saw him. He was walking along the edge of the glass, and I swooped in with my swatter. Flaaap! flapflapflapflap! FLAP!

I raised the swatter to see if he was dead, but he wasn't under it. I looked all over the window and the sill, but he wasn't there. I lowered the blinds and pulled the string that opened and closed them and he wasn't between the slats. Then I heard a little buzz and looked down. He was climbing my leg! One wing was crumpled, but he was trying to straighten it with the other wing, and upward he climbed, looking at me with those bugged out, blank eyes. I jumped backward while brushing my free hand across my leg and flapping with the swatter in my other hand (an athletic agility worthy of Extreme Sports under normal conditions), and then stomping every dark spot on the carpet, of which there were several. Darn quilt clippings. Then I stopped and looked for it as I caught my breath, listening for the slightest sound.

I found his lifeless body next to the chair and breathed a sigh of relief. Then it started twitching as he tried to crawl towards me. Again and again I stomped and when I lifted my foot this time, I was sure he was dead. So once again I reached for my big girl panties which I used to pick up the dead wasp and his still powerful stinger and threw him in the toilet with a "Hasta La Vista, baby" and pressed the lever.

But this is spring, where wasps are bumping under eaves looking for a dark corner to build a nest, where Mayflies hover around porch lights, and anoles perch on the doorframe, all waiting for the chance to get in. Ah Spring, so lovely with your fresh green sprigs of grass and blooming flowers, but must you let these pests out at the same time?

Disclaimer: You do know there really aren't big girl panties, right? I used a paper towel too pick up the wasp.