Wasps, Food Poisoning & Home Maintenance: A Comedy Of Errors🎭

Aug 26, 2025

This week’s title is a strange combination, but perfectly sums up my last seven days. My life has become a slapstick comedy of errors.🎭

Salads ☠️ 🥗

My blood pressure is getting much higher than I’d like it to be. In an effort to keep myself off medication to control it, I’m trying to lose weight and exercise more to get it under control. I was certain that eating more salads would help, so I ordered a couple premade salads from the store…and six hours later I was feverish and losing weight alright, but not in the way I had hoped. I tried eating healthy, and the healthy food tried to kill me. 🤷‍♂️

Wasps!🐝🐝🐝

I was talking to my neighbour about how bad the wasps have become between our houses, and we can’t figure out why. Then, as I was heading back into our house, my wife told me to look up above the door.

I have owned two houses over the last 13 years, and this is the first time I’ve had to deal with a wasp nest. So, I hopped in the car (oh yeah, we finally got a new car) and ran into Home Depot to pick up some wasp spray. I waited until after the sunset, went outside in several layers of clothing, thinking that might protect me, and started spraying. That’s when I saw the wasps leaving the nest, and I ran like hell. It turns out they weren’t flying after me, they were dropping dead on my doorstep. That poison was very effective.

I figured/assumed that not all the wasps were in the nest, and they would return, so I purchased some traps, and put one up beside the door.

As you can see, this was a huge mistake. Somehow all the liquid disappeared, and every wasp in the neighbourhood detected the residual sugar, and turned my trap into a wasp clubhouse. Without the liquid, they weren’t dying, they were treating it like a newfound hive, coming and going as they pleased. This lead me back to Home Depot for more spray. This time I wasn’t messing around. I sprayed the hell out of the trap, then cut it down and sealed in a large ziplock bag until it can be cleaned and refilled.

Home Maintenance🔨

By the time you read this, an electrician will be crawling through my attic to wire up a bathroom fan. I spent the better part of the week trying to get this installed. I had to cut a hole in my roof to put in the exhaust vent, which is where I found out I am still terrified of heights. I then had to cut a 12”x10” hole in my bathroom ceiling, which I messed up by getting impatient and switching to a jigsaw, then flooded my bathroom with wood chips, saw dust and a never ending stream of pink insulation. We all make mistakes…I just happen to be making more than usual this week.😒

The biggest mistake I made was the placement of the fan and the exhaust vent. The holes were planned to be six feet apart, yet I somehow managed to cut them one above the other. The thing about this that doesn’t bother me is that I’m going to need to get the roof redone (professionally), so I can get them to relocate the vent for me at this time.

I also managed to fall slip on the ladder as I was exiting the attic, landed funny on my ankle, smashed my elbow against a mirror and thought for sure I was going to have to go to the hospital, but I got up and was totally fine. My family thought they were going to have to plan my funeral. I think I need to accept, I’m just not much of a DIY guy.

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The “New” Workspace 💻

I’m also getting new electrical outlets added to another section of my basement where I want to set up a writing/workshop area. The timing could not be better!

Last week we had a massive storm that dropped one month’s worth of rain on us in five hours. Water started leaking in around my current workspace, so I had to power everything down. So that’s why I am writing this from my iPhone. I still have my “resume” article in progress, but I don’t want to do that one from my phone.

I’m told we need to replace our bathroom sink and toilet next, but since I now accept I’m not a do-it-yourselfer, that is a project I’m going to hire contractors for.