WAR ERUPTS IN COASTAL EAST

  Cut loose a full four hours early from work, I jaunted home, had a delicious, relaxed lunch, and then decided to mow my recently neglected back yard. I've been seeding it, you see, to fill in some bad spots, and wanted to give it time to grow.
  I gassed up the old grass-chopper, rolled around to the back of the house and began cutting, iPod firmly in-ear.
  Not more than two minutes into the job, I suddenly felt a sharp pain in the middle of my back. Immediately, I knew something had bit/stung me, so I flailed my hand around and tried to knock the offending bug from my backside. Before I could even figure out what had caught me, I was hit several more times on the left side of my body. I immediately let go of the lawn mower, stalling out the dead-man switch. Looking down, I noticed I was enveloped in a cloud of very angry yellowjacket wasps.

                      Artist recreation of attack

  As I realized I was under full attack, I ran for my back door, taking a couple more stings in the process. I stepped over my garden hose and then stopped and picked it up, hoping to blast these insects off of me. Unfortunately, upon squeezing the sprayer, I realized the water wasn't on and I had cost myself precious seconds. Still under seige, I jerked the back door open and ran inside. About fifteen brave yellowjackets came in with me and continued their assault. I swatted at them with my hands and then a dishtowel, but they were too quick. I remembered then that there was a can of Raid under the sink, and I went for it, fogging the place up something fierce. A couple of the little bastards got sprayed directly out of the air and landed convulsing on the kitchen floor. Two or three stragglers were distpatched with the aforementioned kitchen towel of justice.
  I stood there, breathing heavily, heart racing, trying to look myself over. I found another yellowjacket trying to crawl up the inside of my pant leg and crushed him. I brushed my hand through my hair and still another striped kamikaze flew out and then got a dose of the towel.
  I went upstairs to the bathroom and took my shirt off to survey the damage. When I did, a last wasp flew out and met his end under my shoe.
  All in all, I took about fifteen stings.
  After applying a salve of baking soda and water, I decided to visit the local Home Depot and prepare for chemical warfare. I was going to find those responsible for this despicable attack and make them pay dearly. Before I left, I gathered up the carcasses of the wasps I killed in the kitchen and bathroom, threw them in a bowl and set them on the back porch. I wanted the rest of them to see what they were going to look like by the end of the day.

                      Intimidation bowl

  After returning home, I sat down to formulate my counter-attack while I enjoyed some soothing Ben & Jerry's Chunky Monkey ice cream.
  I would scout out their hidden fortress and then wait until just after dark, when the colony was asleep. I would then rain down chemical death on them from above, most likely talking a lot of shit in the process. I would obliterate them and their egg-laying hussy of a queen. That's right, wasps. I said it.
  After formulating my plan, I went outside to retrieve my lawn grooming equipment from the battlefield. It sat, embarrassingly, baking in the sun, abandoned in the initial panic of the attack. As I stepped carefully through the grass, I eyed a nearby bush that I suspected was the yellowjacket capitol. Just then, however, I noticed a finger-sized hole in the ground near my feet. As I peered closer, a lone wasp climbed out of the hole and flew towards me. I made a hasty exit, but I had ironclad intelligence now. Perfect overhead imagery, captured by my own two eyes.
  In the grand tradition of naming weapons of mass destruction, I am calling my genocidal device "Lil Stinker."

                                 "Lil Stinker" device

  Zero hour is approaching quickly. If you'll please excuse me, I have a colony to take down.