A few weeks ago Mike, Nick and I were having lunch at Amazon, a local Westhchase eatery, when the subject of wasp and bee stings came up. We had all been stung by bees when we were kids but that was coming up on 20 years for Mike and I. During the course of the conversation we all kind of agreed that we didn’t remember what it felt like when stung, but we didn’t think it was that bad. Being stung as kids was almost a given, since we had all played some pretty mean games with bees, pretty much the elementary version of fear factor.

Fast forward 2 weeks and I was moseying down a row of blueberry bushes with a handful of blueberries, Dylan on my shoulders and sweat running down my back. Every few feet I tried to stop and pick another handful of blueberries and throw them in the basket that Brandy was carrying, along with a purse and diaper bag. It was around this moment that I thought to myself that it might have been a bad idea to agree to this trip in the middle end of June with a baby and no stroller. It’s one thing to walk around in the heat alone, let alone carrying a not-so-tiny heater on my head and having to try and hold him out of the sun lest some wandering parent think I’m a terrible father. Try picturing me ducking from shade to shade with my tall ass. Hilarious.

We came to a small clearing which had a nice sized bush on the other side, so I hurried across and reached into the middle of the bush, the staff had told us the bushes were a bit picked over so I should reach into the middle, when I felt a pain I didn’t recognize at all and cried out “FUCK! OW!”, followed by a funny dance. I felt something else and tried to swat at the pain, totally forgetting about the baby on the shoulders, when I hear a “Jason, the baby!” from Brandy. Finally remembering the baby I swung my other arm up to steady Dylan, and then that arm caught on fire. After this I ran away with the baby, figuring that the area I was in was not okay and then I heard Brandy cry out in pain, I don’t remember the right onomatopoeia but it was closest to, ”Fuck! Ow!”.

Thankfully Dylan didn’t fall and we only got five stings between us. Speaking from experience, wasp stings still hurt, but only until it turns into a slow throb, which is not so cool. I will not be chasing after wasps with no consideration of being stung.
Evidence of my injuries below.