Last Updated on 5 years by Christopher G Mendla
I have a friend with severe allergies to insect venom. One afternoon I was in my room and saw the mother of all wasps on the window. This thing was HUGE. I was determined to get rid of it but I did something really stupid….
I shut the door to the room and armed myself with a can of insect killer. And then, for backup, I grabbed the electronic insect killer tennis racket. That is a device that is charged by a couple of batteries and has a metal screen that will zap insects with a high voltage arc. At this point, I didn’t know what I was dealing with.
I had the insect spray in my left hand and the fully charged bug zapper in my right. I carefully aimed and sent a stream of toxic liquid across my room onto the wasp. .. It didn’t kill it instantly. It started flying toward me. The little part of my brain that is also related to the pucker function said “Uh OH, you have a pissed off venomous insect flying toward you”.
My next thought was “OK, I’m glad I have the bug zapper for backup”…
Then.. “OH crap, I wonder if the bug spray is flammable”.. Of course, there was no time to read the label. I had a pissed off venomous insect flying toward me… but.. if I hit it with the bug zapper and the bug spray was flammable, I would be dealing with a FLAMING highly pissed off venomous insect.
Fortunately God watches out for drunks and fools. The wasp made a u-turn, went back to the window and died.
I found out later that it was probably a cicada killer. They are not very aggressive (Unless you do the chemical warfare thing on them, in that case they get a little testy). I could have probably just shooed it out the window. It was a good thing I didn’t hit it with the zapper because the can read “Flammable, keep away from fire and flame”
