Thug bees!

Got a call from OH earlier.

"I've just been stung by a bee," he said, matter-of-factly. "Oh, my God!" I went, "Are you feeling alright? Are you breathing okay?" -- "I'm fine," he reassured me, "but I couldn't get any strawberries because J's damn bees are guarding the site gate. I was just trying to unlock it when I had half a dozen attacking me. I legged it back down the path but they chased me and one of them got me on the arm."

As soon as I had got home and cooed over OH's impressive bee sting, I looked up "aggressive bees" on the web and got some patronising bullcrap from the British Beekeeping Association website about how OUR bees are TOTALLY docile and hardly if ever aggressive. Yeah right. Sure they are. OH said he could see them hanging around several metres away beyond the gate. If they were guard bees, they were a tad paranoid. But they were probably swarming, four weeks late this year -- in itself a good sign as this potentially increases the number of bees and either they're waiting for the new queen to hatch or they are queenless, or Q- as the bee-keeping community calls it, and characteristically twitchy and rude.

I've decided I'm going to venture out later on after our cup of tea when it has cooled down enough outside for the bees to want to turn in and leave us lottie holders alone. OH had contacted the secretary and reported the problem and the hive keeper has been told to sort it out.

When I'm back, hopefully with lots of strawberries and in one piece and without going into anaphylactic shock if I do get "got", I shall continue preparing my herbal store, having started with about a litre's worth of apple mint for tea that I'd dried in my study, and stripped dried rosemary twigs of their fragrant needles, for cooking and bathing. Then I need to do a taste test on my dried oregano -- if it's still alright, I'll bag it up too.