I Don’t Think My House Likes Me Very Much

I have a sneaking suspicion that my house is out to get me, which came to a scary realization last weekend, which almost put me in the hospital. The latest threat has me living each day in fear. No, it's not ghosts, but something is definitely a little, well, inconveniently "off".  Friday night was my wake-up call if you will.  We have a stand up planter on our deck which we use every summer to plant basil to make delicious homemade pizzas.  So as the girls were getting the crust ready, I headed out to pick the basil.  I was filling up the bowl, when I started to hear a creaking noise, and suddenly felt a shift.  I quickly retreated, and turned to see our deck was starting to crumble.  Thankfully, our deck only stands maybe 2 feet off the ground.  It also did not collapse, but who knows what only 30 seconds more would have brought.  If the deck did collapse, it would have tossed me down the hill to the side of the deck, which is a sloped drop, and I have a feeling I may have had some pretty bad cuts.  Scary, but thankfully all is avoided.  The silver lining is I've got a new deck coming.

But that's not the only problem.  We've been noticing wasps around the house.  A couple weeks ago, we saw a few by the front door, and discovered a small nest starting.  No big deal, but we kept an eye on it, and it didn't seem to be growing.  But yet, there were quite a few wasps still around the house.  Then we started to see them on the patio swarming the umbrella.  This worried me, because at the start of the season, we opened up the umbrella to find a bunch of what we though were dead bees inside it.  Turns out they were sleeping, because by the time I came back with the spray, many were gone.  Looks like they've come back to a favorite spot.  So while I'm trying to figure out how to open the umbrella to check it out without getting stung, my daughter remarks she's seen wasps on the side of the house.  To distract myself from the pending doom and stings of the umbrella situation, I go to check this new theory out.  I wasn't ready for what I was about to find.

Above the downstairs window, tucked up under the overhang, is not one, but two good size nests, covered in wasps.  We're talking a good 60+ wasps in total between the two nests.  Yikes!  So I get the spray, but realize, based off the angle, there's no good way to spray without being way to close for comfort.  My other option is to lay on the grass, but then I cut off my chance at a quick escape.  To make matters worse, when I was mowing the lawn this weekend, I saw another wasp or two swarming around the poles of the swingset. Pretty much, I'm going to be stung at least once before this whole battle is done.

I've since been able to spray the swingset, sprayed the small unused nest by the front door, and have attempted to spray the window nests and umbrella.  However, while I may have eliminated a few, I still have yet to clear them out. Frankly, I'm really pretty nervous about the whole thing.

Between the deck, and now the wasps, I think I might be ready to move, especially as these things come in threes.  I'm not looking forward to "the next shoe dropping."

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