Actually not bees. I believe we are dealing with yellow jackets, or “predatory social wasps.”
Handy got stung by a hidden nest in our yard during the summer. But I digress.
I wanted to discuss my apparently new position as book store yellow jacket remover.
People freak out. Get rid of the bee! Um, I don’t think it’s a bee. But I’ll take care of it. So then I deal with it. Yes, there are yellow jackets around the trash right outside the door. Solution: I carefully empty the trash.
Bee (yellow jacket) in the window. But please don’t kill it! Solution: I cover it with a glass, slide some paper between the pane and the glass, carry it out and let it go near the street planter. Also I empty the trash again because that’s where they are congregating.
I thank my years of elementary school playground/lunch duty for the ability to deal with this in a calm manner. Those lunch table yellow jackets loved sandwiches! And the trash. Solution: cover your food. Empty the trash.
I can also deal with spiders, scuttling black bugs (smash ‘em!), dead or only slightly flapping objects the cats used to drag in, (solution: dustpan) and in a very new twist, bold pigeons walking straight into the store (solution: run them back out the door)! I can’t deal with fully flapping things so if the pigeons take flight inside then we will have a problem.
Co-workers are grateful that I deal with “bees.” I doubt they will deal with the full metal pigeon invasion.
Although work rumors say “solution: falconer!”
