You are doing a family photo session and you and the family are attacked by a swarm of angry wasps? Because that is exactly what happened to me and the Williams family last night. There we were, at the base of Little Cottonwood canyon (.."oh yes, Erica, we should do your pictures there for sure. What? Yes, of course it will be a safe place for your kids..") minding our own business, when Chad (the dad) gets stung by a wasp, twice. "Great," I think as he runs off, presumably so his kids don't hear him swearing from the pain, "I wonder if he is coming back? I don't think I can photoshop him in.." when all of a sudden we are all being swarmed by these bees. And we take off, running back up to the parking lot, screaming like the scene from Tommy Boy. (your firearms are useless against them!) The poor brave five year old, Jack, was covered with them, and was stung several times. I got stung once, and am ashamed to say that I swore. A lot. So there we are, running and screaming (and in my case swearing) up this trail when Chad starts flipping out because one has gotten in his pant leg. And here is what I yell. (hysterically, might I add) "Just take your pants off, take them off!!!" Because I can't help but think that this is a better solution then getting stung in the pant area. It drew some stares from the people standing around us, who oddly enough continued to stand there as if we were insane rather then come to our rescue, but they probably thought we were. We hopped in the car and sure enough, just as we are all getting settled and counting up our wounds, one of the kids starts screaming "WASP!!" and four doors fly open and the five of us come pouring out of the vehicle waving our hands and screaming.
Eventually we were able to get in the car, but not without everyone going in the same door, and sitting on the same side of the car until we were sure that the little creep was gone before buckling in and getting the hell outta dodge. We saw another photog there about to head down the same trail so we warned them through a crack in the window, and they looked like they didn't care that there was a swarm of killer blood thirsty monsters on the loose. Evidentally they did not see the scream fest earlier.
Anyway, two slurpees, four bags of ice and some benadryl later, we decided we would redo the pictures in a more urban environment after we have all recovered from the shock of it. A big thank you to Chad for the benadryl and topical ointment, and a big hug to Jack and Nixin for being so brave! (And I forgot to ask, but Erica, if you are reading this, were you running up the hill in your picture shoes? Because if you were, that was some fancy footwork, my friend, great job!!! )
