bee attack

Last weekend, on a gloriously sunny Saturday afternoon, I was cruising 180 out of Weatherford with the windows rolled down rocking slightly stoopid for all to hear. Just as the city streets gave way to county road…

A small cloud appeared ten or twelve yards ahead of me. It was just off the road, rising quickly out of the ground and into my path. I had no choice but to plow through the cloud at fifty-plus miles per hour. My windshield instantly exploded in a yellowish, chunky goo, and I felt needle pricks from the tip of my fingers up my arm to my cheek, and around to the backside of my neck

…the above paragraph took almost half a second. I thought my life was over. Well not that dramatic. But I did swerve a bit, getting a honk from the jerk in the next lane. Yup, still alive. And crap, still in Texas. I hit my windshield wiper knob and noticed some funny looking somethings stuck in my wipers. About that time, I noticed the tingling on my left side turn into a stinging sensation. It all came together in an instant: bees. Lots of bees. Probably five or six hundred bees, no joke. My windshield was completely covered with guts (which was a very citrusesque mangoish yellow with bright yellow chunks), and my lap and the inside of my truck were littered with at least fifty bee carcasses.

I was pissed. The actual bee stinging and covering of my truck (the entire front end and a good part of the left side, probably an entire hive; a little justice for my side) did not bother me as much as being allergic to hornets, and as of that morning, an unknown number of other species of stinging insects. And I hate finding out my allergies the hard way (hornets for one, and ask Robbie at kiwi’s (yes, kiwi, like the fruit, not the native New Zealander)). So I’m driving along, having just been [potentially fatally] stung by ten or so bees, I channel the final scenes from both My Girl and The Fast and the Furious, racing towards the hospital (conveniently, the same direction I was already going) for a few minutes, until the stinging subsided and I learned I was not allergic to bees. The rest of the day turned out just fine.