My Dad had a Wasp in his Pants...

…for over 4 hours!

Yes, it was alive.

Here’s the story, my dad works outdoors with heavy equipment (phone company) and wears the expected wardrobe which includes steel toed boots, heavy denim carpenters pants and stuff. He gets home from work on Thursday of last week, does his usual routine of plopping down in his recliner with a snack once he gets home to watch a little TV. My mom and aunt are there visiting, and they all begin making idle chit-chat. The topic turns to dad’s day at work (guys don’t you hate when women ask that?) and he says it was fine except for the fact that he got bit by something on the leg. No big deal really, he’s a tough guy, but it made for conversation and got the discussion off him. My aunt starts prattling on about one of her neighbors who got bit by a Brown Recluse spider earlier that month and narrowly averted dire consequences. An anecdote which I’m sure was comforting to ole pops. Anyways, they pop on some Seinfled, going about their dull suburban lifestyle.

Suddenly my dad pops up with a confused (or would it be concerned?, tough to say really) look on his face. He quickly begins dancing around like a fool. Ok, back up a sec, note that dad’s a very big guy, about 6’7" and 300 lbs if he’s an ounce. Not particularly spry at his age either. So you can imagine what a sight that must have been, this big lumbering dude, bouncing around on one foot and shaking the leg to his dirty work denims. Low and behold, whats should come fluttering out the bootom of the cuffs but a huge wasp. Probably over an inch long, and fluttering across the room. The ladies scatter amid shrieks, US Magazines and Marshall Fields circulars tossed into the air. Dad yelling to mom to fetch the Fly Swatter. After a bit of chaos, the little beastie was dispatched off to the great hive in the sky.

Anyways, so he was “bitten” sometime around 2 in the afternoon that day. He continued his workday, which would have consisted of digging, driving trenchers, loading equipment onto trailers, a considerable amount of scratching, driving the rigs back to the garage, telling dirty jokes to the guys, having some snacks, driving about 10 miles home in his personal vehicle over the next 2 or 3 hours. Then he would get home, park the truck, saunter inside, rustle up some chow in the kitchen, plop down in the La-Z-Boy, make some awful puns, demand the remote and begin the chain of events detailed above.

All told the sucker must have been hanging out in dad’s drawers for close to 4 hours or more. Shockingly he was only stung that one time. My mom’s theory involves some kind of “gas warfare” which must have stunned and incapacitated the winged menace during that time. Certainly plausible if you know my dad…but still.

Needless to say he’s gotten his fair share of teasing over the whole thing. Only wish I had it on video…

::: adds the name of Omniscient’s dad to the list of guy that are tougher than I am :::

Has your dad considered selling his flattucide to Ortho? Should he do so, all of you could retire comfortably in ummmm… more ways than one.

There’s a joke in here about a “little stinger,” but damned if I can find it.

Something similar happened to me when I was a kid. Mom had hung our clothes out on the line to dry, as she always did in the summer. I grabbed a clean pair of shorts out of my drawer and put them on, only to be promptly stung in the butt. Can’t imagine having it there for several hours, though. Ouch!

… or “Rectum? Heck, he darn near killed 'em!”

That’s a great story.

There are a lot of wasps up by my cabin. Just about every weekend I have to take down a nest and sometimes they get inside. I think they look more frightful than they really are and they seem to be pretty slow unless it’s really hot. I got stung on the palm of my hand when I put my hand down on the arm of a chair - on a wasp. It certainly stung (my wife and I thought I had withdrawn my hand so quickly it didn’t have a chance to sting me really bad) but it wasn’t nearly as bad as getting stung by a yellowjacket and having my hand swell up like an inflated surgical glove. Yellowjackets are nasty aggressive f#$%ers. I find wasps to be a bit more peaceful and will only sting when they’re getting smushed. Which of course only leads to them really getting smushed.

IANAE, but I think you’re probably refering to hornets here, not yellowjackets. Though it could be a regional thing. Hornets are mean nasty little shits. Yellowjackets are the bee-like critters tha have a habit of flying into the tops of soda cans. They sting and can be pretty unpleasant, but I wouldn’t call them aggressive.

The “yellowjackets” I had the misfortune of being stung by were in Colorado. They were big (bigger than bees), and had black & yellow abdomens.

They looked most like a Dolichovespula arenaria (aerial yellowjacket aka sandhills hornet).

Hmm, cool site. So many of them look alike, they look about like the ones I was used to growing up, but mine were rarely bigger than 3/4 inch and only stung if you were especially mean to them. They’d hover all over picnics and stuff without causing too much trouble.

Omniscient

I live in Denver, and I know they ones you are talking about. I now have some hornets/yellowjackets living some near my condo’s balcony. They remind me of “cicada killers” you can find in TX. They are literally about 2 1/2 to 3" long and 1/2" thick.

When I lived in TX, though, there were these red wasps with black wings that were mean as #$%t. they were also really resiliant to wasp spray. if you sprayed them, they just got mad for about ten seconds and then they died. It was like they would hold on long enough to get you. Hornets are second on my list.

BTW: Omniscient your Dad is supertough. I would have been out of those pants in a heartbeat

I know the red wasps of which you speak. Big mother-humpers, about 2 inches or more in length. I got stung in the palm by one once about two years ago. I reached over without looking and grabbed a broom and he was perched on the handle. Understand that I grabbed this broom with gusto because I was anxious to get the work done, so I squeezed the handle pretty hard. Naturally, I killed the wasp, but stuck the stinger in but good. The words which proceeded out of my mouth would embarass a San Diego sailor. Wallpaper peeled, walls shook, buildings collapsed, mothers took children off the streets for miles…

…I’ve been stung by a scorpion and this sting was probably 10x worse. It was the F5 of stings, I tell you what…

You know, sometimes the hijacks that take place on these boards are quite impressive. Entymology ferchrissakes.

I certainly hope I never come across one of those “cicada killers”.

Got stung on the ass when I leaned up against a hollow steel pole which contained a black hornets nest as a pre-teen. Wow that fucker hurt, I ran really fast home and I swore they chased me the whole way.

Don’t worry. Even he has a hard time finding it. :wink:
Bah-dum-pa

When I was growing up in Dallas, I was stung about 15xs by those little bastards. They like to hunt for spiders or whatnot in the lawn so you can’t always see them until you step on them. then all of a sudden the little red satan wasps go ballastic. they do hurt like hell. When I visit my family who still live in TX, they like to make fun of me for doing the avoid-the-wasp-who-cares- what-it-looks-like-dance.

…Makes note to get a wasp hive in preparation for next date…

Or was he just happy to see your Mom?

My dad once got a yellow jacket in his pants leg while mowing the lawn. He said a lot of words that I can’t repeat here. Years later my brother and his friends were mowing a neighbors lawn. They were attacked by wasps and ran away, leaving the mower running. When they came back to get the mower the wasps attacked again.

We used to see those big red paper wasps which we called “red devils.” The smaller blue mud daubers would scrape up mud by the creek and use it to build places to store the spiders they paralyzed. One year my mother and I found out they were storing the paralyzed spiders in our garage. They’d attached the mud tubes to the walls.