REVENGED

My mom was determined to handle our pest problem. After they made her baby daughter's foot look like this:



she decided to see revenge. She swore up and down that she could just use a "torch" to light the nest on fire and the whole nest, wasps included, would catch on fire and burn up instantly.

Here is her first attempt:



That was not so successful. They just got angry, flew around and came right back to the nest. And what you can't see in this video is that Mom RAN into my apartment waving her fiery torch, nearly setting our couch on fire. Evan had to shout "FIRE! FIRE!" before she realized she was still holding the torch and ran to the sink.

A few minutes later, she decided to go for the nest under our steps, the ones that attacked me:



She claimed victory, that she got them nest and all. But later when we left the apartment we noticed she hadn't set anything on fire. The wasps and nest - including all the little egg sacks - were still there. She had mildly burned it but not enough to do any damage. So we almost set fire to the apartments and angered every insect in Davidson county. Awesome. Wasps 1, Mom 0. They may have won the battle but not the war - she wants to try Raid spray later today. I will NOT be outside to film that.

**Update: We bought some wasp spray at Target. I waited in the car while Mom, with a towel over her head, sprayed not one, not two but three wasp nests. They dropped like flies (flies with a big fat stinger, that is) as soon as the spray made contact. Success! I waited safely in the car to make sure they were good and deceased, then took the spray for myself and sprayed a big one that was already dead just for good measure. I couldn't help but smile victoriously as I lugged my fat swollen cankle up the stairs past the watery graves of about 15 to 20 dead wasps.

So the final score? Wasps, 1, Mom 10. Game over.

(I know we call them bees and wasps interchangeably in the videos, but after they were dead on the ground, I got right up to them for a very, very close inspection. Survey says: wasps.)