I'd just got back from the dentist after having my front teeth done, only to find someone had burgled my house . . . still at least I could smile about it.
(That was a joke).

The real story goes like this . . .

I'd just got back from the dentist after having my front teeth done, true enough. I was getting bored dribbling a mug of tea down my front and what I really needed to do was 'phone some people. Not a good idea when you have a paralysed mouth. "Hawo, ith me". So I thought I'd do something useful until the anaesthetic wore off.

It was autumn, it was hot. I decided to do some hedging - what a hero. Hedging, for those of you unfamiliar with the skill, involves the 'laying' of a hedge. No, it's not as painful as it sounds. It involves the clearing of scrub, brushwood, brambles and so forth, from around and within a hedge using a long billhook; then, using a short billhook, you work inside the hedge, bending and weaving the best wood and 'laying' the hedge low. This makes for a good, stock-proof hedge which will generate powerful new growth.

As I said, it was hot. I had stripped down to just a t-shirt, skin-tight leggings and wellies. I could feel the sweat building up in my wellies, sweat was in my eyes, I was thrashing with a 2-metre billhook and only had 50 yards to go - it was then it happened.

'Slice' . . . straight through a large wasps' nest.


The first thing I knew of was a wasp hitting me right in the forehead, and it stuck to my sweat then fell down between my sunglasses and my eye.

My reflex action was to dodge back. But, of course, it was stuck between my sunglasses and my eye and was now stinging me continuously.

I could see its abdomen wriggling around and the only thing protecting my eyeball was the eyelashes themselves. In one desperate move I jumped back and knocked my glasses to the ground.

It was as if I had jumped back onto a barbed wire fence, five stings happened instantly around my rear, followed by an attack wave to the front. One got me an inch away from my genitals. Arms and face next . . . it was hopeless . . . I was going down. My t-shirt and stretchy leggings offered no protection whatsoever - I might as well have been naked.


RUN AWAY!!!


I dropped everything and ran. They kept coming, so I kept running. The only place I could think of running to was the river. After a distance I found myself thinking I was in a cartoon strip - The Beano or Oor Willie. Luckily for me wasps are no good at tracking humans and I lost them after a couple of hundred yards.

I must have taken 2 dozen hits easy. I had no idea whether I was allergic to wasp stings or not - particularly this concentration of them. I was panting heavily after the run and quite away from home. But soon the adrenalin calmed down - after all, I am a 6ft chunk of solid Scotsman that can wield a felling axe in each hand.

The wasps had a grievance - I was in pain - now we were even.

My eye was so swollen that I could no longer see out of it. The funny thing was that they could have stung me on my top lip as much as they liked and I wouldn't have felt it. Fortunately I suffered no allergic reaction, just an incredible amount of pain.

To this day I can recall, frame by frame, that wasp stuck to my eyelashes, stinging me.

It's something I will never forget.

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