Breakfast: the best way I know to eat strawberries. I’m only even eating breakfast so I can take some ibuprofen in the morning for the heel pain, going on three months now. I toughed it out for two months but was barely able to function. With winter coming, I need to be able to be on my feet more than off them and so, I’m grateful for making the best of a bad situation.
I’m grateful for wasp spray and diatomaceous earth, which also helped me make the best of a bad situation. Today we flipped over the kindling-cracking stump when I was pretty sure the wasps were all dead. No wonder it took so many attacks to end their assaults: The nest was massive. I stood by with spray ready as my garden helper turned the log over; even after all that I’d done, I saw one moving inside so sprayed it before he rolled it off the patio. Next time he’s here I’ll ask him to split up the rotten log, and then I’ll burn it outside. I’m so curious to see how the nest filled the cavity, and if it conformed inside the log as it did flat at the bottom.
Above, the carnage left below when he rolled the stump away. Lots of rotten wood, and a horrifying number of dead wasps. I feel so bad about causing so much death — and yet I could not live with them. The pill bugs are alive and well and scavenging, I suppose. I hope the diatomaceous earth doesn’t hurt them–and if it does, I guess that’s what you call collateral damage…. That was definitely a bad situation, and I will be more proactive next spring to keep the yellowjacket nests away from the house or anything else I need to go near; and this winter I’ll knock down all the old ones under the eaves.
Finding a moment of peace down at the pond, before wasp harassment drove us back inside
My little town. My neighborhood. Teaching. Scavenging. I couldn’t decide until I realized the umbrella they all fit under is finding what I need. I’m grateful for finding what I need today.
Feeling on a bit of a rocky plateau in mindfulness practice, I was grateful for finding camaraderie and meaning in a meditation and meeting I led this morning, with some wonderful graduates of the Foundations Course I teach; and then in the afternoon, finding common ground and ease with some wonderful new acquaintances in a course I’ve just started taking. Later, resting in the comfort of a zoom chat with Amy.
Grateful for finding what I need for a delicious sandwich for lunch between zooms
I’m grateful for finding what I needed at the Hitching Post in town, the little store that has one of everything you could almost ever need. I needed a couple more cans of wasp spray. I hate to use it, but we’re not able to spend more than a few minutes outside near the house, or even sit still as far from the house as the pond, without being threatened by an aggressive wasp. I don’t think it’s the same wasp every time (but it could be); I think they have guards stationed all around the yarden to drive me inside. But it’s simply too lovely, in this most beautiful season, to be imprisoned by fear of wasps. They continue to rise from the stump, and I found another huge nest under the deck just outside the east door, and another in a decorative pot on the patio corner.
I’m grateful for finding the time to take the scenic loop to town and home again, driving around the reservoir to enjoy the first fall colors turning up on Mendicant Ridge, and the plenitude of all that community water still behind the dam.
Grateful for finding salad greens to meet the needs of Biko and myself this evening
After dark, I dusted the stump with diatomaceous earth, grateful to find that in my garden supply drawer; unfortunately, that roused the wasps quickly, and I was stung again on the tender skin inside my forearm. It wasn’t as bad as fast as the last one, but continues to swell so I’ve taken another Benadryl: grateful for finding what I need in the medicine drawer.
After all that poisoning, I wanted a hot shower but it was already down to 40℉ outside and all the windows and doors were open. So I shut most of them, and found enough small pieces of wood to kindle a fire in the woodstove. Grateful for finding what I need without having to split kindling, since the kindling cracking pedestal is still out of commission. And I could go on: finding hot water at my fingertips, noticing how dry my hands are and finding lotion on my desk, finding Biko quickly before dark so I could bring him in for another cold night. Extremely grateful for having enough conveniences and luxuries so that I almost always find what I need without having to look too far or hard.
Grateful for finding the canine companion I need just in the nick of time…
I’m grateful I had a productive morning, because I lost the afternoon to the aftermath of a wasp attack. It was a grilled cheese kind of a day: chilly and grey outside, and cold in the house. Smoked gouda with avocado and garden tomato, yum! It kept getting cooler, so I decided to build a little fire in the freshly-cleaned woodstove. There was no kindling split yet for the season, so we stepped outside to crack a few sticks from a well-dried aspen log set on top of the two stumps I’ve been using as a kindling-cracking pedestal for many years.
Crack! one stick. Crack! two sticks, and a wasp on my wrist cuff, and then another, latched onto the fabric, and suddenly I realized I’d disturbed a nest in one of the stumps and they were streaming out angry and determined. I also noticed poor little Wren running around snapping at her tail end, so I hurried to the other side of the house calling her after me. One stung my right index finger and I pulled out the pumping stinger. I swept my arms gently, not frantically, to keep them away, and they kept following. So we kept hurrying away. By the time I got to the back gate there were only a few left but they were persistent. We went out the gate and I pulled off my sweatshirt and swung it slowly in a circle above my head to keep them at bay, but one had gotten up my loose shirt and bit my belly. I dropped the sweatshirt and we kept hurrying away, Wren spinning to bite her back end and me sweeping my limbs to clear the air.
We walked the whole Breakfast Loop and came around to the front gate, grabbing the can of wasp spray from the back of the Mothership where I’d set it after spraying a nest in the side door the other week. I don’t like to kill them. By and large I let them live as they like, and just avoid areas where they nest, but as I was working on the Mothership and needed access, I had to kill that nest. I didn’t mind that one wasp snuck up my sweater sleeve last week and got my thumb pad when it felt trapped, even though it itched and hurt for days afterward. But I felt inclined toward vengeance after this all-out attack, especially since they hurt Wren.
But first things first. She was still hurting when we got inside, and so was I, so I poured some liquid baby Benadryl into her bowl which she lapped up, and I took the Therapik to my injuries to laser the venom enzymes. Maybe it helped, maybe not. By then my finger had swollen stiff and gone numb, and my whole had was turning red, so I popped a couple Benadryl tablets and squeezed on some cortisone cream. Then I looked out the window and watched where they were entering the stump. I waited until near dark so they’d all return to their nest before spraying the crack. The can quickly emptied, but there seemed enough to do the job, as no wasps flew out.
I’m grateful for Cousin Nurse who suggested a topical anesthetic, which reminded me I have Aspercreme with Lidocaine, so I’ve been slathering that on liberally. Wren calmed down and we both went to sleep for the afternoon. She seems now to have recovered completely, though I have not. I popped another couple Benadryls just now and am trying to type with an ice-pack on my hand which isn’t very effective–kind of like the Benadryl tablets, which are pretty old. Time for lights out, grateful for surviving another day in Paradise.
