A Sting in the Tail

It's mid October, the nights are drawing in as we say in Scotland and autumn is upon us. In a couple of weeks the clocks will go back an hour in the UK heralding the official end of summer and the onset of winter. This means the discovery of a third unwanted visitor to the Smith household in the last few days has forced yours truly to take action. I refer to wasp number three which made a valient attempt to hug the radiator in the bathroom yesterday before its worthless life was terminated with haste. Now I realise there may be a tree-hugging hippy or two who will take issue with my description of a wasp's life as worthless. And they will be horrified that I actually took away a life. But what purpose do these blighters serve other than to annoy, irritate and frighten people. At least bees have a duty to perform for Mother Nature - wasps don't. These striped barstewards can sting and sting until their heart's content and still come back for more.

I suspect yesterday's wasp was related to the one which I thought I had obliterated on Saturday evening. In fact it was well after midnight as I was reading the Radio Times in bed that something flew by my lughole with that droning sound that is wasp-speak for 'ha-ha! You think because it's October and it's half past the witching hour and it's only a handful degrees above freezing that you're safe from me. But you're not!' Minutes later I walloped the offending insect with the aforementioned Radio Times but couldn't really settle into a deep sleep for fear the blighter would return from the dead. It had been just a few short days since another wasp had stung my daughter Michaela in an area I wasn't prepared to remove the sting - and I'm not talking about the bedroom here...

Wasp number three has led me to believe there may be an infestation in the house. My suspicion lies with the loft but I'm not prepared to venture up there to risk an aerial bombardment from thousands of wasp family members wondering where three of their compatriots have disappeared to recently. I'd rather get someone else to take a look. I've had a look on the internet and I also used the good old-fashioned method of looking in the Yellow Pages. Thankfully, there are a number of companies in the Edinburgh area that deal with such problems. A couple state in their advertisements that they provide various services - including unmarked vehicles. This made me smile. Now I know they say this in case you don't want Fred Bloggs next door to realise you have an infestation of any kind - whether it's wasps, pigeons, mice, in-laws...But for a moment I had this vision of the wasps watching a van with Pest Control emblazoned on the side pulling up outside my house and the Queen Wasp making a high-pitched drone to her subjects and screaming 'right lads and lasses, it's the man in a white boiler suit and a mask - lets buzz off...'

I know what you're thinking, dear reader - the Auld Reekie Ranter has had one too many brandy and lemonades again. Perhaps it's the fact I'm on leave this week and may have more time to think about these sort of things than is natural. This morning was a case in point.

Just before 11.00am I spied a large brown enevelope lying on my doormat. It said "DO NOT BEND ".

I spent the next two hours trying to figure out how to pick the bloody thing up......