Flight of the Bumblebee

Actually only a few make it to flight, most of them end up lying in wait on my bedroom floor.

In case you are a new reader I will recap our living arrangements. We are living in our barn until our ship comes in, at which time we hope to build a house.

We can't see the ocean, a river or a lake from here, so I don't know how the ship will get to us. I have a suspicion that the ship is not even coming but we still keep waiting for it.

We don't have drywall or any kind of ceiling in most of our humble home, it was suppose to come on that ship as well. But we do have insulation in the ceilings. For some reason, the bumblebees chose our bedroom ceiling insulation as a good, safe, nesting area.

We had a good working relationship with the bumblebees to start out with, we didn't bother them and they didn't bother us. It wasn't until the new babies started hatching out that the problems began. Newborn baby bumblebees are not that frightening, and can in fact be considered cute like most babies.

I discovered that little baby bumblebees can and will sting if you get under the covers and try to share a sleeping space with them. That sting is just a little annoying and the pain doesn't last all that long.

As time has gone on we have found that baby bumblebees grow into children then into teenagers rather quickly. In each stage of their lives we have also found that they struggle to survive in the frigid temperatures of our bedroom.

With our little window air conditioner cranked up to its highest or should I say, lowest setting, only the very strong and healthy young bumblebees can actually find and use their wings successfully.

The rest of them end up scattered around on the bedroom floor on their sides trying to right themselves. They do occasionally make it to the side of the bed and manage to crawl up onto the bed or at least under the covers. It is really nice, if when they make it under the covers that they then find and figure out how to use their wings. That way, the noise will alert you to their presence.

I would venture to guess that we have killed approximately 14 flying bumblebees recently inside our house. I would not even try to guess how many we have picked up and disposed of that were on the floor and bed. We are starting to see a decrease in numbers, so I would say that we are about to be done with it all.

I had considered us pretty fortunate that we had only had one stinging incident and when I went into the bedroom to turn the air conditioner up a little because the weather outside had cooled down so much. I felt a little foolhardy to be in that room with no shoes on. While I thought on these things a sharp pain shot through my big toe.

My DH and I spent some time discussing which was worse; a bumblebee sting or a hornet sting. He assured me that a hornet was much worse. He gave me no sympathy whatsoever. As if I should just forget it ever happened.

Then last night he got up several times after we had gone to bed. I warned him each time. Finally, this morning, I heard him say, "ouch!" and I knew what had happened. I was ready for him too. I told him it was nothing and that a hornet sting was much worse.

This has all brought about a scientific study. I was telling a neighbor about my Husband getting stung by the hornet the other day and she told me that she got stung once in her arthritic, swollen finger.

After the sting her finger never bothered her again and all of the swelling in it went away. Now my DH's toe that he just got stung on has given him fits throughout the years, we'll have to wait and see what happens.