Big rainstorm drives our bees away; imitation isn't flattery

 We had tremendous rain all day Wednesday with high winds. It was kind of odd for this time of year, but when it finally stopped raining around dinnertime, the air was much cleaner and there were more stars visible in the night sky than I've ever seen here before. The rain did result in an unwanted change for me: all the bees departed the hive on our third floor balcony. I immediately saw the change when I went up to read that night -- there was an empty hive with a little honey visible, but no bees. I hope the bees moved on to a safe and drier location. I went downstairs and got my wife and we went up and cut the hive away from the branches it was built on and put it in our fridge. There was a tiny bit of honey remaining, and we squeezed it out and gave it to the kids the next day. I had a small taste and it was quite good, although perhaps a bit thin from the rain. Reading upstairs hasn't been the same since the bees left. I would accidentally bump a branch with my water bottle and the bees would get agitated and crawl all over each other, presumably to protect the queen. And once I got stung when I bumped a branch, and it took over a week before I could get the stinger out. Ah, those were the days. I'll miss seeing those bees when I read. The swarm turned hive was on our balcony for just shy of a month.
* * *
Joanna, Elijah and I went to Gosanke Koi Coffee and I pointed out a spider spinning a web near the water to my daughter. Joanna stayed to watch while I chased Elijah and prevented him from jumping into the water to play with the fish. Joanna yelled for me to come back and see something, so I returned to see a dragonfly caught in the web. I didn't even think to take a picture -- brilliant, huh? We didn't stay to watch the spider enjoy dinner.
* * *
One of the down sides of being a white monkey here is that I receive a lot of unwanted attention. And I do mean unwanted. My daughter was having a public meltdown -- it happens on very rare occasions -- and I also had Elijah with me. I really couldn't focus on my daughter to calm her down because Elijah would run away or also melt down if tried to hold him while dealing with my daughter -- the dreaded double meltdown. So Elijah and I headed toward the park while Joanna shrieked. Some shirtless adult male stood in his doorway mockingly imitating Joanna's screaming. I called the clown on his behavior, and signaled for him to come over and calm her down. He lost a staring contest to me and went inside his house. On the plus side, a woman watching us picked up the stuffed animal that Joanna threw into the  busy street in anger and gave it to us. A sobbing Joanna still had the wherewithal to say thank you. Earlier in the week in the smaller of the two parks, Elijah and I were playing soccer -- kicking and chasing the ball around, actually. When Elijah would kick the ball off the pavement and into the bushes or onto the grass, I would say, "Oh no!", get the ball Elijah. Two guys were attempting to smooth some concrete, and one of them mockingly copied me three or four times saying "Oh no!" to the great amusement of his buddy. Since they were imitating, I yelled to Elijah: "Matriculate the ball down the field!" about three or four times. The imitation stopped at "Oh no!" Sometimes, I'm just not in the mood for what passes as humor to some folks, especially when it's 97 degrees and I'm taking care of an energetic 22-month-old boy.
* * *
Joanna insisted we get a live sturgeon at Mega Mart and have it filleted. She watched the whole process and wanted the guys killing and cutting the sturgeon to say sorry to the fish. Didn't happen. My wife did a nice job cooking the nearly five pounds of sturgeon and it was dinner for two nights with some donated to Phuong's family. ... I damaged my left foot pretty good on a monster walk. It may be an inflamed tailor's bunion, according to Dr. Internet, so we'll see if the pain subsides. At least it takes my mind off my back.