COLUMN: Wasp

I'm terrible at multi-tasking.

When my "to-do" list piles up, I prefer to check things off in order, focusing on one task at a time. That's not happening this week, and it's driving me bonkers. Multi-tasking isn't in my nature -- and nature is what put a stop to it today.

I was hoping to check a few things off that list over my lunch hour. I left the office with my mind in twelve different places. I was so focused on multi-tasking that I barely noticed it was chilly out. "Brr," I thought absent-mindedly as I rolled my window up. It was the best decision I'd made all week.

At the next stoplight, it happened. I looked to my left in just enough time to hear a tiny "thwap" as a wasp the size of Mothra smacked into the window I had JUST rolled up.

There are many things I hate in life, but few so much as wasps, bees, or any stinging insect. I'm allergic, they all CLEARLY know this, and thus they live to torment me. I am a fully grown adult male who acts like a complete ninny whenever a bee comes near me. Scratch that, ninnies surely act more rationally than me. Bees are horrible, vile creatures that need to be wiped off the map. I realize this would disrupt the food chain and likely end the human race, but it's well worth the dying knowledge that the bees were finally defeated.

But today was a rare situation. There I was, inches from the most irrational fear in my life, yet safely behind glass. Perhaps I could use this surprise opportunity to carefully study the wasp, marvel at its complex biology, and attempt to better understand and appreciate such a majestic creature. 

Or perhaps I could made a noise like "ahhhhhhtplf!" while recoiling in horror and almost rear-ending the car in front of me. Who's to say for certain?

"You ARE the weakest link, goodbye!" I yelled as the light turned green and I drove off. But my new friend didn't leave. He clung to that window, staring me down with his beady little wasp eyes. I thought he'd fly off at the next light. Instead, he started banging his blood-thirsty head against the glass Jackie Chan-style like he wanted in. 

I crossed the Centennial Bridge. The winds were brisk. The river had whitecaps. And yet, despite his wings flapping around in the breeze, my new friend clung to the window relentlessly. This was the Tom Cruise of wasps, and his impossible mission was clearly to sting my face off. 

I pulled up at my house and this little minion of the damned was still attached to the window staring me down. I tried pounding the glass, yelling at it, and even opening and closing the car door real quick in hopes of getting it to fly off. No dice. Clearly, the only one having a worse day than me at this point was the wasp. He was probably just looking for food. Instead, he got a face full of window and an all-expense trip across state lines. "Just fly off, dude," I begged. Instead, the wasp casually walked to the base of the window and started to squeeze through the seal at the bottom.

Nope. Nope, nope, nope. In reality, the poor wasp was probably trying to get somewhere dark and quiet to regroup. In MY mind, he was descending INTO the car door so he could more easily climb round the other side, squeeze in the car, and obviously sting my face off. There was no more multi-tasking in my future today. My to-do list now had but one singular, homicidal vision. I quickly assessed the situation and decided there was only one mature and well-thought-out option.

Eight minutes later, I was on the interstate, laughing like a madman while pushing the boundaries of the posted speed limit AND my car's acceleration. If I got pulled over, I would simply explain to the nice officer that NO, I couldn't roll down my window, and by then the wasp would've stung HIS face off and it'd be a non-issue. In the hurricane-force winds I was now creating, the wasp crawled out of view and I could only hope been eventually whisked away to the hellish plane from whence he came. I was now a good seven miles from work, but it was worth it.

I returned to the office feeling strangely accomplished for someone who'd precisely done NOTHING on his to-do list. Hopefully none of my co-workers witnessed me leaping like a fat ninja from my car, still half-expecting the wasp to be clutching the side of my car, holding an axe and yelling, "Heeeere's Johnny!" Its out there somewhere now, likely hellbent on vengeance, and now it knows where I live AND work. Buying a can of Raid just became top priority on my to-do list.