I have allergies.  I am not disabled by my allergies and they have never been life-threatening – they are simply annoying and inconvenient. 

My respiratory and eye-itching allergies are your basic assortment of grasses, weeds, trees, pollens, dust, and mold.  Add to those 4 foods: eggs, shellfish, rice, and coffee.  Eggs and shellfish are pretty common.  Rice and coffee are just bizarre.  I always knew I had “hayfever” and I always knew I had a “sensitive stomach”.  Finally, in my 30’s I went to an allergist for testing and discovered the whole messy list.

I did the allergy shot routine for a number of years until suddenly, about a year and a half ago, I missed a month in the middle of summer allergy season and didn’t notice.  That was my hint that my body had finally adapted and with my doctor’s blessing I discontinued shots. [The shots work for the airborne allergens, but not for foods, the best you can do there is avoid them.]

Meanwhile, my daughter has been showing signs of allergies.  The signs and signals would appear and disappear somewhat at random.  One day she’d have hives and then she wouldn’t.  Her eye would get red and itchy and the school would send her home with pink eye only to have the redness disappear by evening.  This year, though, she started showing a pattern of coming home ill early on Mondays.  She has come home early more Mondays than not since September.  We tracked it to air quality issues at school and an air purifier in the classroom has helped, but still, it was time for some answers.

Yesterday, I took my daughter to my old allergist, or at least his office.  He is long retired.  A quick look at swabs from my daughters’ nose indicated lots of  “allergy cells” and so we started testing.  Two hours and 60 skin tests later and the conclusion was that my daughter “defies logic”. Nothing, absolutely nothing, showed a significant reaction.  Yes, a few teeny tiny reactions to the usual dust and cats and such, but nothing that would be consistent with allergy symptoms in the middle of December.

There is a name that I can’t pronounce, let alone spell, that means “allergic reaction to an unidentifiable allergen".  That’s her diagnosis.  So she is back on her antihistamine, has a cream for the rash she gets on her arms and legs every so often, and a nasal mist for her stuffiness.  On one hand, I wish there were a treatment so she could get better and not have reactions.  On the other, I don’t really wish allergic reactions on her and it does make me feel less like a slacker mom.  Her symptoms were so transient and so unpredictable that I couldn’t figure out what in particular she was reacting too.  Apparently the allergist can’t either.

We go back in two months just to check in.  Perhaps then I will also see about getting an epi-pen just in case one or another of us have a bad reaction to a bee sting.  Eventually, she is bound to get stung. Given the unpredictability of her reactions to allergens it might not be a bad idea.

http://www.kold.com/Global/story.asp?S=11554613

By Mark Stine – email

Tucson, AZ (KOLD) – Rescue crews came to the aid of two boys Sunday afternoon. video

Okay just so you know ive been working 16 hour days for 3 days in a row.. so im just typing it all in lowercase.. hands are aching today …

Brave Girl - BEE BEARD

I was all happy I finally finished the manuscript for The Munroe Mansion – The Beginning – Book One.
This week I’m checking punctuation like “” ‘ ‘ and !
I’ve got to make sure there is a beginning and end to my “quotes”. My thoughts are in ‘ thoughts ‘ and my !!!!! marks – WAY too many. So I changed my ! to . in most cases

The easy way to do it in Microsoft Office 2007 (what I’m using) is using the FIND option.

Find ” and it highlights every one of them, how I quickly switch to next, just by pressing the ENTER key.

or you can use
Fine ! and replace . which was the second search I did because I noticed that I’m !!!! happy

If you make a correction double click with your mouse, and go back onto the ” if you don’t, then you’ll do what I did several hundred times today. You put a SPACE between your sentence and half of it
goes like this

when
you
dont want it too…

oh i was all happy
thinking
I was almost done, then I go back and realize what i did?

CAse in point…

Don’t be tired when you revise..
I’ve been cramping it in on 12 to 16 hour days…
it’s not working

sleepy writer

so i had to go back to the 4 hours on, take a 1 hour break, then 2 hours on, take a 30 minute break.. then 4 hours on… take 2 hour break,, then another 4 hours on.
thats 14 hours of work and maybe 5 or 6 hour sleep and it just didn’t work for me.

so i’m going back to the 4 hours on, call it quits for the day.

When your writing and typing it’s okay to go longer, but in revising, you have to stay sharp.
I realized my blunders and had to go back and fix them.
After 12 hours my computer started acting up.. it didn’t want to save what I had done.

It was fighting with me, DAM updates, (reboot in 4, 3, 2 1 grrrrr)

you get so intent on what your doing , you don’t realize MR. Computer is just doing his own thing in the background there.

You walk away.. (didn’t save it, after all I was just going to be away for 5 minutes to make a coffee) and I come back, and MR Computers rebooting away all by his little self..

Now I’m like okay I wish I had a baseball bat, I’d clunk MR. Computer over the box, because he just erased about an hours worth of work on me.

mrcomputercoffee

why can’t I have AUTo SAVE in word?
It’s in ONE NOTE?
why not in WORD?

Then dummy here goes and saves it in a file folder… the munroe series.. simple enough

she’s left it alone for 4 days, and goes back..
what does she do?

she starts on the file.. yep the one floating under documents on c drive… the munroe mansion book one

I’ve done pages 1 to page 200, now wait a minute, i know I’ve corrected this one BEFore????

dopey realized OH NO>>>>>>>

i picked the floaty file, instead of my neatly organized one in file folder… the munroe series – book one – the munroe mansion

case in point…

don’t know what is the most recent file?

right click with your mouse, pick properties.. and there VOILA is the date and time of your last SAVE

properties find the date and time of the file you saved. right click mouse

WHEW… i thought my computer had gone on strike and Mr computer wasn’t saving anything…no i saved it alright but it was put on one of my many flashdrives (yes I’m copy happy) only they are all green, and I can’t remember WHICH ones have it and which ones don’t/

give me a break… I worked for 16 hours on it.. and saved it to ONE of them.. but then I open it up and cannot remember the NAME of the file.. now that’s nasty… i have like 100 files on the go

case in point…

keep a daily journal of your work, a special workbook for ONLY THAT project.. yes I know I have about 50 workbooks kicking around in my office but its easier for me to see what date I worked on something and when and what i’ve accomplished.
Grant it because I have 3 sitting on my desk, the other day I wrote all my notes in the wrong book. Im so lazy I left them in the wrong book, made a note of which book title it is (printed on front cover) and the date and time (EASY REFERENCE TOOL)

** note picking a different pattern for each project is an easy filing system too**

artist-journal

So this is why I haven’t blogged everyday.. I was actually on the computer today but time wise, 12 midnight rolled around before I could POST to thursday’s date LOL

Do you ever get the feeling that some unseen force is working against you.

It’s a miracle folks.. that i still have lots of hair on my head.. maybe a few bald spots from me pulling on it.. (just kidding)

pulling-hair-out-women

I was so tired I went outside last night for some fresh air and realized I had my jammies on.

so i came in the house, changed my clothes and went back out again.

I came back in the house, put the clothes away and decided I wanted different jammies to wear.

today i pull out the jammies i had put away from last nights WALK and there attached all over the bottom of them are these BLACK things?

i thought they were bugs and of course i jumped and screamed then i took a closer look and realized they are BURRS.. honest they look like microscopic beetles…

God.. where on earth did i get those?

Out in the field, walking the dog… oh yah,

case in point..

dont wear long flannel jammies outside when taking dog to go piddles…

Last WEEk in my yellow housecoat… i got another little friend to visit me…

I actually had a bee go for a ride on my yellow housecoat last week, then the bugger stung my right knee while i was busy blogging.. without stopping, i smooshed him with my slipper then started to itch my knee.. at the time i didn’t realize i had been stung, i assumed it was a fat mosquito that pricked me.

I noticed the RED swelling spot (about 4 inches by 3 inches on my knee cap the next day) and the itching got worse..

I finally sprayed vinegar on it.. then rubbing alcohol.. stingy sting sting.. takes the itchies away though

I’ve been riding my buddy to and from school with a delightful joy bubbling deep within.  I laugh at the cars and feel slightly giddy at saving so much fossil fuel.  I have gotten the gumption to go around the long lines of cars stopped at South Pasadena High School and think, “I bet you soccer moms are jealous!”

Yesterday, I did not laugh however. Yesterday, I cried.   This was due to a small insect, namely a bee that flew directly into the crease between my helmet and face and began to sting me.  I don’t think I calculated the pain of a facial bee sting into my cost of riding the buddy.  OWWWWW!  I managed to safely pull into a parking lot before bursting into tears.  Currently, I now resemble someone infected by elephantitus, though the Musician claims I look as beautiful as ever, I know that the entire right temple is swollen to twice the size.

My courage has not waned however, and that very ride proved the utility of riding a 125cc since I was able to scoot out of the parking lot across 3 lanes of stopped traffic and into the left turn lane.  (Safely, of course, don’t worry Dad!)  I’m ready for the next adventure, which is perhaps coming sooner than I want it since it is raining today for the first time this season.  A week too soon for the shipping of my waterproof pants!  Ride on!

Well, this is embarassing. It seems that Azzurri captain Fabio Cannavaro has failed a doping test. Yep, you read that right. But don’t all run off screaming “AHH ITALIAN CHEATERS!” just yet. Apparently, what has happened is that our dear friend Canna is allergic to bee stings – apparently – and so when stung by a bee during training Juventus medical staff gave him a shot of cortisone to prevent him from going into anaphylactic shock. For those of you not pharmaceutically inclined (or who have never had a rash) cortisone is a steroid. It should be noted that had CONI, the administrative body responsible for doping testing in Italy, received the proper paperwork regarding Cannavaro’s medication, this all would’ve been fine. It’s not an outrageous prescription for cortisone, and Juve’s medical staff needed only to notify CONI of their administering the drug to Canna. However, as it stands Fabio Cannavaro is being questioned by CONI in Torino regarding his failed test. I expect it to come to nothing; Cannavaro has been accused of doping before and it was found then that he was clean — they’ll probably accept the explanation, as it is fairly reasonable. The only thing I have to ask is: just how stupid do you have to be to work for Juventus’ medical staff?

"It fucking stung me! Where's the cortisone?"

Last wednesday we harvested the Pinot Grigio.  I decided to to try my hand at harvest, but I think I was more harm than help.

My Grandpa also helped, so we were both in the parking lot by 6:30 a.m. 

 The first step of harvest is to unload the grape lugs from the barn. 

Then we harvest!

Little known fact: if there is even a small puncture in the grape, it can start to ferment on the vine, especially if harvest is late in the season and the sugar content is high.  Todd decided to pull the Pinot Grigio at a fairly high brick count, which means there was a lot of sugar to ferment in the grapes. 

So, when the bees buzz around and feast on grapes, they actually get drunk!  Of course, Todd told me this like it was no big deal.  I thought it was hilarious!  Until one of them stung me, which I promptly used as an excuse to get out of the  grass and the bugs and stop harvesting.

Pinot and Chardonnay are my favorite grapes to look at; the pinot has such a beautiful maroon color.  Below is a picture of the offending bee…

Signing off from Hawk Haven Vineyard and Winery in Cape May County, NJ – Cape May Wine Country ~ Cate Hylas

This week has been a bit stressful. My marine son was supposed to deploy last week but the ship had problems so that did not happen. Now we are doing Semper Gumby and waiting for the word to go. Since we have to pick up his car, we can not really make plans for any thing. 

We went and visited our twins yesterday. They have really grown and are more alert than ever. Wuzzy even smiled at us! I did not take any pictures because the other grandpa was taking many pictures and I hope to get a hold of some of them. But it was a nice day with the boys.

Cinderella and Tango went on a hike and encountered a rattlesnake but managed to avoid a snake bite. Tango walked away with a bee sting. Butterfly won a Huffy bike from her daycare. Now she owns two bikes. Very exciting for her!

Today I am doing laundry and I cooked a tortilla casserole, that I just winged. I tastes good and I will be eating it for lunch tomorrow. I have to work overtime next week in anticipation of not being at work on Thursday and Friday. Sometimes I hate Semper Gumby.

Today’s Sunday Brunch recipe is Juliannah’s Tortilla Casserole

Start with a basic white sauce:

In a small, heavy saucepan, melt 2 tablespoons of butter over low heat. Blend 2 tablespoons of flour into the melted butter. Add 1/4 teaspoon of salt. Cook over low heat, stirring, for 4 to 5 minutes. Cooking for this length of time will minimize ‘flour’ taste. Slowly add 1 cup of milk, stirring constantly. Continue cooking slowly until smooth and thickened.

I added some Jarlslberg Chesse that I needed to do something with. Next I added some chopped onion and tomato, about 1/4 cup of each. I boiled  about a pound of chicken and cut five corn tortillas in strips and then cut them again.I layered the chicken and tortillas and then mixed in the sauce mixture. I seasoned with onion powder, salt, and pepper. I then put about 1/4 cup of grated cheddar cheese on top and baked this at 350 degrees for about twenty minutes.

Yum, it turned out well and tastes great. I am just not good at following recipes and much better at improvising.

Happy Sunday!

I found myself out of commission during the beginning of the week as the result of a bee sting. It’s the third such sting in the past two years and is primarily due to my proximity to the bee hive kept by a close neighbor. I’m allergic; as I write this, my left hand – where I was stung – is still significantly swollen.

In light of the fact that I have been through this process before, I thought that this most recent experience would provide an interesting opportunity to reflect on the pharmacokinetics of the reaction. I admit that I find my reaction to the sting quite fascinating as it completely shuts down my body for several hours and has implications for a day or so after the initial sting. It’s humbling to recognize that I am 6′4″, 170 lbs., athletic, and can be completely debilitated by a creature no larger than half an inch in length.

So… I was stung on the middle finger of my left hand while washing the dishes. Within seconds I removed the stinger and cut off the circulation to the inflicted finger using my right hand. However, even as my finger was turning purple, I could feel the apitoxin entering into the palm of my hand. At this point, I recognized that my makeshift truncate was useless, and notified my friend that I had been stung and asked him to keep an eye on me in order to make sure that I didn’t go into anaphylactic shock. I sat down on the couch and waited for the reaction to go through its course.

Within approximately 10 minutes I could feel my skin start to tingle and itch, my breathing became laborious. Within 20 minutes, I was starting to peak, my armpits and scalp itched relentlessly, my skin was crawling, red and tingling, my throat was swollen and my lungs were heavy, my breathing had become difficult and shallow (I imagine that this is similar to what the lung inflammation associated with Cystic Fibrosis might feel like), I periodically coughed as if I had bronchitis, my heart rate had increased and my whole body was sweating profusely. I checked in with my friend to indicate that although I was obviously uncomfortable, I was okay. After about 30-40 minutes I felt as though I was on the down slope and my body was recovering from the exposure to the toxin. After approximately 50 minutes I felt well enough to stand up in an effort to finish the dishes, however upon reaching the sink my vision contracted to black, the blood rushed from my head, and I was forced to return to the couch where I laid down. At approximately 70 minutes I had come down to such an extent that I felt comfortable enough to take a shower, after which I went to bed from exhaustion.

The following morning, my head had a definite fog about it and my left hand was still swollen to such an extent that it was unsightly and uncomfortable to type at work. Only now, after 3 days, my left hand could pass for normal, although I can still see the difference when compared to my right hand.

This allergy is a potential danger that I have to live with and have since taken precautions in order to react to it better. Although some might suggest that I ask to have the hive moved or disposed of, I choose not to, for I value those bees greatly for both their honey, which I often cook with, and for their work pollinating the flowers around the neighborhood. Furthermore, in light of the devastation manifested from colony collapse, I think that it is important to support beekeepers.

I shot this image when the Nortel-Ericsson deal was going down this summer. I was much happier shooting the signage than shooting the committee meetings that ensued. I spent time lurking around the Nortel Carling campus trying not to get nicked by security, but didn’t make much more than the standard images. I liked this frame because it felt ominous with the sign rising from the ground like a tombstone as the last vestige of Ottawa’s high-tech scene died away. Luckily a schwack of the laid off Nortel employees have been offered new jobs from Ericsson.

Ps,  I got stung by a bee making this picture. That’s the last time I lay in a ditch topless.

Bg

I have also posted a few more images from the summer to my Flickr account.

I took a picture of my perineum using a mirror. This isn't it.

There are a lot of things out there that keep me indoors and away from windows.  My life revolves around avoiding things that scare me and wearing hair nets.  As much as I’ve tried to overcome some of my most basic fears, I always find ways to reinforce them.  The following is a compilation of the 10 worst times I’ve ever been scared:

10.  My poop turned blue for three days after eating TCBY’s Arthur the Aardvark’s Cotton Candy flavored frozen yogurt.

9.  After snapping some voyeuristic pictures behind a circus tent, I was mauled by a black bear.

8.  I was unable to take back a pair of denim jeans at the Gap.  Now I just keep things.

7.  I got a bee sting on my boner. (Thank you, Johnny & J-Pa)

6.  I cut my perineum (see left; “incision”) on a barbed-wire fence while tobogganing in France.  I had to wear a heavy flow maxi-pad for a week.  (And that’s the closest I’ve ever been to a woman.)

5.  I was held at knife point at a McDonald’s drive-thru for sarcastically ordering a “Crappy Meal”.

4.  I held a pee in so long playing the drinking game Edward Forty Hands that urine sprayed out of my nipples.

3.  My mother adopted me from my grandmother.

2.  Thinking I had found the last morsel of food in my house, I once ate a lot of cat food.

-And Finally-

1.  A maniacal and murderous clown named Adam who lives in a brightly colored  school bus parked in a mountain meadow is stalking me via MySpace.  (My real name is Liz)

Had my second meeting with St. John Ambulance (SJA) today.  The first meeting I went to was three months ago, near the end of May before I left for Japan.  Today we quickly reviewed Emergency Scene Management and Patient Assessment (just the primary survey and critical interventions) then went straight to hands-on learning which I love.  After going through some basic pt assessments with the pt conscious and unconscious, we practiced rolling a pt with delicate spine from prone to supine and also reviewed placing a pt in recovery position.  Then came the fun part:  Scenarios.

Half of the class went outside of the classroom as First Aid Attendants (with the door closed of course), and half of the class stayed in the room as our Superintendent prepped the patients with the scenarios and what they’re suppose to act out.  During my turn as an attendant, our Superintendent told us that we were working at a Beer League (where players drink beer), dispatch has been told by a bystander that one of the players has heat exhaustion.  After determining that the scene is safe to enter, I approached the patient.  I found that he didn’t fall, so no spinal injuries, he’s conscious and talking, breathing rate and heart rate is normal, he keeps on complaining that his finger hurts.

Me:  What’s happened to your finger?

Pt:  I don’t know!!  My finger!  It hurts! It hurts!!

I checked his skin and it was moist, warm, and pink.

Pt:  My finger!! My finger!!

Me:  Are you feeling dizzy?

Pt:  No…but my finger, it hurts!

I took a look at his finger, it was swollen and a bit red.  I’m now confused.  I know that heat exhaustion means that the patient should be cool and clammy.  He’s a little sweaty but otherwise warm and dry (which is normal since he’s out in the sun).  Could it be heat stroke?  Yet he doesn’t appear ill enough or hot enough to be having a stroke.  He keeps on complaining about his finger, yet he doesn’t know what happened to his finger.  The patient is stable but is he coherent from all the beer?  I’m starting to feel very confused.

What is there to be confused about?  Nothing.

I remember being told that a call is usually not what it’s said to be.  Medics have told me they have been called for a 5 year old for difficulty breathing only to arrive and with no 5 year old in sight.  In fact, they ended up with a 50 year old patient.  I know that what dispatch tells you usually isn’t what you’ll find at the scene.  I know of this, yet that did not translate to not being influenced at a scene.

My patient in fact, did not have heat exhaustion but what he did have was a bee sting to his finger.  I’ve been totally played.  In my mind I kept on thinking heat exhaustion, heat exhaustion, heat exhaustion.  I kept looking for signs of heat exhaustion only to be confused when my primary survey showed otherwise.  Instead of trusting my assessments, I kept on worrying about heat exhaustion, worrying that my patient may actually be worse than he appears to be, worrying about something that was not actually there.  I also neglected to ask the pt what type of pain he was feeling.

My Superintendent taught me a good lesson today:  Keep your mind clear and be confident in yourself, take what bystanders and dispatchers tell you as a possible scenario, but always follow your assessments and treat your findings not what you’ve heard from others. 

But seriously, I think I would’ve known it was a bee if a bee stung me on the finger.

One of our favourite activities to do on the weekends is head to the dog park with coffee in hand for some serious exercise (for the dog…not for us!)  Lately on the weekends we’ve been going to Trinity-Bellwoods because it has a fun crowd, is usually quite busy, its large and has lots of trees for the humans to stand under.  At Trinity Timmy just runs and runs and runs.  Until today.

Timmy had just completed his business on a hill when he came over to me, limping.  He was trying to lick his paw and then he started to cry.  We took him to a quiet corner and tried to examine him.  He tried to bite us and yelped in pain.  It was so sad!  Almost instantly the paw began to swell up.  Saturday at 1:30.  Our choices: Go to the local vet hospital (across the street) before closing time, or wait and see if it improves and risk having to cab up to the after hours emerg later this weekend.  We opted for #1.  We popped into Queen W. Animal Hospital and asked if they could see us.  We aren’t patients there, but after our experience, we would definitely consider it.  They squeezed us in after the clinic closed at 2, and were so friendly and caring to our little pup.  He had to be muzzled while they checked for a break or puncture wound, just in case, and the whole time the paw swelled steadily.

In the end, it seems he was simply stung by a bee.  He got a shot of Benadryl, and instructions for his care over the next few days.  $130 later, we have a healthy, and dozy pup!  Looks like its going to be a quiet weekend for us!

Two days ago a bee stung me for no good reason. I was walking at a shopping plaza and felt a hella sting on the arm. Flicked it away before I understood what it was. Took the stinger with it but the arm still swelled up terrifically. And later itched like mad.

Yesterday I realized this was a cosmic nudge to start the blog I had been thinking about. Therefore, here it is today.

Ouch!!

I got stung by a bee, today! The first time in my entire life!

How did this happen, you ask? Oh, it’s simple really.

You see, I was outside grilling my steak… where I stepped onto the grass. Apparently, bees have no sense of danger and allow themselves to be stepped on by creatures 1000 times their size.

Following the crushing blow of my foot to the bee’s head, he jumped into defense mode. All he could do was shove his minuscule spear-of-an-ass into my heel and hope for the best.

It worked, let me tell you!

At first I felt a slight poke and passed it off as… “oh, i’m standing on a twig”. Then it hit me… “there was no twig when I walked over here… wait a minute… it’s poking MORE…. what the–” and just as I went to move my foot and look down, the sharp internal burn set forth throughout my entire heel.

Ouch.

I quickly lifted my foot, looked down, and to my dismay discovered a terrified bee.. flapping around in a desperate fury to no longer be crushed by my apparent giant-human-foot. He quickly flew away. Leaving me standing, one-legged, dumbfounded as to what had just occurred.

The pain subsided in about 10 minutes. And yes, my steak still ended up in my belly.

Nothing can keep me from my food! Not even a bee!!

—–

In other news: I attempted to make my own Mayo today. Boy was that interesting… !

It turned out alright. I used this recipe. However, I altered it to use Coconut Butter in place of Olive Oil and no salt. It turned out sweet… but it’s really yummy! I’m thinking of maybe adding some fresh Garlic to it to better counteract the level of sweet. This would make a lovely Garlic Aioli Mmmm…

Today’s Menu:

Breakfast: 3 fresh Barhi Dates (post-workout)

Snack: 2 Sugar Pears

Lunch: Steak & Salad

- 1 New York Strip Loin Steak, grilled

- 1 tbsp Home Made Mayo

————

- 1/2 cup Romaine, shredded

- 1 handful of Blueberries

Snack: 3 Pears

Dinner: 1/2 cup Red Grapes

Snack: 1 Apple

——————————————

Nutritional Analysis:

——————————————

Physical and Emotional Changes:

1. Severe decrease in energy and mental focus after Steak meal, could it be the meat? Or the FAT (coconut)?

2. Energy and focus uplifted post  grapes.

3. Got stung by a bee.

I just got stung by a bee on my left achilles tendon. My sock was not much defense against this attack.

This literally just happened. It hurt pretty bad, but not that bad. It was mostly just surprising. It got me two times and did not leave a stinger and I saw that motherfucker fly away taunting me. This marks the third time in my life that I have been stung by a bee. Once when I was about five, another time when I accidentally stepped on a dead one in third grade, and now today. I guess I am lucky to have gone that long without being stung by a bee because now I remember how bad it sucks. Mainly the place it got me sucks because I feel it with every step I take. I realize that bees are necessary for pollination and that the cycle of nature would be fucked up without them but I am going to kill these bees by my house as hard as I fucking can right now.

These are not just your average bees. I have been killing them periodically throughout the summer and they keep coming back so based on the theory of survival of the fittest these are the most bad ass ones left. Before the one stung me, ten of them flew right at my head like they were World War II pilots on some kind of bombing mission. I should have gone inside but I just kept cutting my grass.

 I bet that bee that got me is their hero now. I hope you enjoy your moment in the sun, bees. I going to fuck you up now.

To make matters worse, when this occurred I screamed “Motherfucker!!!!” really loud. I looked over my shoulder and saw that a bunch of little kids and their parents were one driveway away from my house because they just got off of the bus.

3 more bee stings.  I am re-thinking my hypothesis that the bees were antsy about the change in the weather last week.  The bees from the same hive stung me today.  When a hive is having queen trouble they get ornery – so it is possible that this is the problem – - their queen may not be living up to expectations.  I need to get back on the horse that threw me and see what is going on inside that hive (hmm, antsy, horse, enough animal metaphors?) – - but the next time I will bring the smoker and wear gloves.  I really don’t like wearing the gloves, I feel very clumsy in them, but obviously this hive, at least at the moment, is too ornery to deal with without them.

A friend, who also keeps bees, recommended putting toothpaste on the stings.  For her it took away the sting and she didn’t have any swelling.  I’m trying it this time, and so far the stings with toothpaste on them are not as swollen.  I have a sting on the side of my middle finger, right hand – and most of that toothpaste was worn off by hanging and taking down laundry – that sting is also the most swollen.  Or, it is possible that there is a 4th sting on that hand, I really kind of lost track when it was all happening.  My son was helping me though – and he’s smarter than his mother and wore gloves.  He put the hive back together by himself because whenever I got near it the bees would start harassing me again – they could smell the sting pheromone left by their sister – another reason that a smoker is helpful, it masks that pheromone.  Live and learn.

All the bee news is not bad.  The front hive is calmer than the back hive, seems to have more bees than the back hive also, and is making some new comb in the honey super (finally!)  

In other news – down by the hives I found a monarch caterpillar on a milkweed plant, but more impressive (and easier to keep track of) there are 9 monarch caterpillars on the butterfly weed in our flower garden!   I hope they stay and make their chrysalises on the plant.  I’ll let you know!

It is an August day, warm and a little humid with an increased chance of rain tomorrow.  It’s cloudier now than earlier so if you are paying attention you can tell the weather will be changing.  But I was paying attention to my schedule and not the clouds.

We have plans this evening, we have plans tomorrow – if I was going to check on the hives it would need to be this afternoon.  I had made some adjustments in the frames in an effort to encourage the bees to build comb in the two top boxes, the honey supers.  I was anxious to see if it was working.

I have had good luck with the bees.  Only two stings so far – one early on from being clumsy with a frame and another when a bee got caught in the crease of my pants when I squatted down (awkward spot, but frankly the bee stung my jeans more than me).  The last several times I had opened the hives the bees had been very docile and pleasant. If I wasn’t going to pull out frames they had built on I often didn’t wear a veil.  I’ve stopped wearing gloves altogether.  I often have a t-shirt and shorts on and only 2 times out of probably 20 have I been stung. I was feeling pretty proud of myself – I was The Bee Whisperer.

You can see where this is going, can’t you?   First, a beekeeper is never going to be called a “bee whisperer” for the simple fact that bees can’t hear.  What bees can do though is be very sensitive to changes in the weather.  A bee does not want to be caught in a rainstorm – a drop of rain can do mega-damage to a bee.

I was just putting on my veil (being cautious today), when a guard bee began buzzing around my head, warning me off.  I walked away, lost her and came back and opened the hive.  This hive was fuller than usual and noisier but not especially aggressive.  I took off the top box and looked between the bees and the frames of the next box and saw what I wanted to see, comb being made on one of the foundationless frames. I put that hive back together and moved on to the second one.

This is a less populated hive, but still when I took off the cover numerous bees streamed out immediately and indicated in no uncertain terms that I was disturbing their peace.  Again, I took a short walk away to let them calm down.  I came back and took off the top box and began peering between the frames of the next one down when I realized there were bees on my wrist around my black watchband.  Bees do not like dark colors and if they are going to go for you they will often attack where there is a strong contrast, say between white flesh and black leather.  I whipped off the watch and threw it in the grass, hoping the bees would go with it.  Too late – they got me twice, and I think they stung my watch too.

I scraped off the stingers, not feeling too sad that the stinging bees bought the farm, but feeling a tad humbled.  I had made mistakes that brought the attack on myself.  I had worn a black watch band against my pale skin, had ignored the fact that the weather was changing, and I had failed to pay attention to the numerous signs that that the bees were already agitated – the early warning by the guard bee, the general noisiness of the hives, the increased number of bees that were home mid-day, and their irritability at having the covers lifted. 

So now I have a couple of baking soda poultices on my wrist, a wiser but humbler beekeeper.  But, hey, the bees are starting to build comb in the new box, and that’s good news.