If by any Freak of a Buzzing Bee-face chance I am ‘released’ before 8pm I will call you
(Subject from a friend of mine, EKM, trying to arrange to see each other in real life for once...)
Oh Sting, where is thy Death? Someone called Justin O. Schmidt has created the “Justin O. Schmidt Sting Pain Index,” which runs from 1 to 4. He rates insect stings and describes them as one would a wine ...
"... a bald-faced hornet sting is “Rich, hearty, slightly crunchy. Similar to getting your hand mashed in a revolving door.” A wasp known in the American Southwest as the “tarantula hawk” made him lie down and scream. On the other hand, the sting of a bullet ant in Brazil (4-plus on the pain index) had him “still quivering and screaming from these peristaltic waves of pain” twelve hours later, despite the effects of ice compresses and beer.
In fact, most insect stings do no damage at all, except to the two percent of people who suffer an allergic reaction. They just scare the wits out of us. And this is why they fascinate Schmidt: We typically outweigh any insect tormentor by a million times or more. We can outthink it. “And yet it wins,” said Schmidt, “and the evidence that it has won is that people flap their arms, run around screaming, and do all kinds of carrying on.” It wins “by making us hurt far more than any animal that size ought to be able to do. It deceives us into thinking serious damage is being done."
Most of the 60,000 stinging insect species don’t waste their venom on people; they use it primarily to attack tomato hornworms, cabbage loopers, and the like. And if they were not out there busily killing agricultural pests, we would starve. So the zen bottom line here is, next time you get stung, try thinking of it not as a curse, but as one of the small blessings of summer.
Can't remember why I kept this article bookmarked for so long, I suppose I just found this person's occupation fascinating. Hm. Couldn't find any pictures of bees or wasps on Corey Helford's gallery website so here are some works by Chris Anthony that I enjoyed. If 15 year old goth Tani had seen these she would probably have gone wild.
Oh Sting, where is thy Death? Someone called Justin O. Schmidt has created the “Justin O. Schmidt Sting Pain Index,” which runs from 1 to 4. He rates insect stings and describes them as one would a wine ...
"... a bald-faced hornet sting is “Rich, hearty, slightly crunchy. Similar to getting your hand mashed in a revolving door.” A wasp known in the American Southwest as the “tarantula hawk” made him lie down and scream. On the other hand, the sting of a bullet ant in Brazil (4-plus on the pain index) had him “still quivering and screaming from these peristaltic waves of pain” twelve hours later, despite the effects of ice compresses and beer.
In fact, most insect stings do no damage at all, except to the two percent of people who suffer an allergic reaction. They just scare the wits out of us. And this is why they fascinate Schmidt: We typically outweigh any insect tormentor by a million times or more. We can outthink it. “And yet it wins,” said Schmidt, “and the evidence that it has won is that people flap their arms, run around screaming, and do all kinds of carrying on.” It wins “by making us hurt far more than any animal that size ought to be able to do. It deceives us into thinking serious damage is being done."
Most of the 60,000 stinging insect species don’t waste their venom on people; they use it primarily to attack tomato hornworms, cabbage loopers, and the like. And if they were not out there busily killing agricultural pests, we would starve. So the zen bottom line here is, next time you get stung, try thinking of it not as a curse, but as one of the small blessings of summer.
Can't remember why I kept this article bookmarked for so long, I suppose I just found this person's occupation fascinating. Hm. Couldn't find any pictures of bees or wasps on Corey Helford's gallery website so here are some works by Chris Anthony that I enjoyed. If 15 year old goth Tani had seen these she would probably have gone wild.
