As seemed to be universally the case in my memory, as a kid I just couldn't leave a wasp's nest alone. Few things seemed to excite as much focused energy as trying to put an end to such a threat. Over time we graduated from crude rocks and sticks to shotgun blasts, rags soaked with kerosene and held at a precarious distance with the longest pole we were able to procure and so on. Thus directed, we leaned our creative bent. Our creativity eventually reached its high water mark with the launching of bottle rockets into the heart of the hive, directed with lengths of pipe and a welding glove over the end of it to protect our hands from the gleefully anticipated ignition. To our peril, our escape was complicated by the difficulty of trying to run while laughing our heads off and looking backwards...no simple achievement and one rewarded with mixed results.
As a married and responsible homeowner in a small town, such tactics had to take on a less spectacular yet equally effective venue. A couple of years ago I had the fun of summer painting in a second story eave on a 28 foot ladder. With paint can in one hand and brush in the other, my face tilted awkwardly against the angled under surface of the soffit I was dismayed to discover numerous yellow jackets entering and exiting a small hole above a decorative knee brace and into the wall directly in front of my face. Dropping the brush and hastily descending the ladder I needed a few minutes to calm down. Of course I tried hanging a wasp trap and sprays with limited success but the angle of the hole prevented me from really shooting the spray into it. Time was going by and the paint job schedule was beginning to slip at an alarming rate. What to do? I hit upon the idea of wiring up the nozzle of my wife's vacuum cleaner through the sash window and inches from the hole. My wife wasn't too supportive of the scheme but turning it on for half and hour each day for a week and a half necessitated only a couple of removals and reinstallations--well worth the risk/reward ratio of watching countless yellow jackets approach the entrance only to be pulled off course and vanishing as if into a black hole.
Sometimes the man is richest whose pleasures are the simplest.
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Today's Featured Article - Restoration Story: Fordson Major - by Anthony West. George bought his Fordson Major from a an implement sale about 18 years ago for £200.00 (UK). There is no known history regarding its origins or what service it had done, but the following work was undertaken alone to bring it up to show standard. From the engine number, it was found that this Major was produced late 1946. It was almost complete but had various parts that would definitely need replacing.
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