Comic Cuts — 6 October 2023

My war with the insects took a dramatic turn this week. As you know... actually, maybe you don't know. I dislike insects and cannot stand them buzzing around, especially while we're eating dinner or last thing at night. A month ago it was little moths, now its flies. What I want to know is: what are the spiders doing about it?

We're not talking swarms, just two or three every evening... just enough to annoy. And, boy, do they annoy. I guess the warm summer has been perfect for bugs, but it's autumn now and the bugs are sluggish. But still hungry, and with fewer whatever they eat around they're getting bolder. I try to wave them out of the window when I can, but I must confess that I have been breaking out the fly spray.

Word must have got around because on Tuesday—which is our day for putting out the green waste—I was in the garden trying to fill up a couple of bags. We're only allowed four every fortnight, so I like to make the most of pickups and we already had two full bags.

We dug out some old gardening tools recently, which I have been trying to revive as they were thick with rust. Coke and rubbing with scrunched up tin foil was the advise of one website, and that seems to work. The coke is cheaper than vinegar, and we've ended up with a drawer full of previously used foil that Mel was threatening to throw out anyway. I've rescued a tree lopper, and a pair of hedge shears, and lawn shears.

I was using the latter to cut back some ivy when I felt a bug on my neck. Lifting my arm to brush it away only trapped it under the neck line of my t-shirt and I felt a sting in what I'm going to call my posterior neck muscle—there are, I gather from Google, more than twenty neck muscles, so I can't be more precise. My head jerked forward, which allowed the bee to escape. Fortunately, I was able to get the stinger out quickly, so I know it was a bee, not a wasp.

I washed the area with TCP and dabbed on some hydrocortisone cream. I could feel a dull ache in the muscle for a couple of hours, but didn't have a bad reaction, so there was no harm done and I was able to carry on. Only to stop about a minute later, as pulling up the ivy uncovered a nest of bees that were sheltering in the undergrowth.

I believe we have ivy bees, which have only been found in the UK since 2001 (this according to the Wildlife Trust). They're active in the autumn when ivy is blooming and they might be around until November. That's fine. They own the garden now.

Aside from being dive-bombed by bugs and stung by bees, it has been Badger Books all week. I'm astonished to say that I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Here are a couple of pages to whet your appetite.