Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with bee

Bzzzzzz Burp

Unred — Fri, 16 Oct 2009 19:31:12 -0800

What do I do with bee pollen?? I bought some bee pollen at the farmers market last weekend. And despite being a little delicious over yogurt, I'm not sure what the point of it is. Google searches don't seem to help much and I've found no way to find exactly how I should be consuming it. And why I get gross burps later in the day after eating it. Does anyone have any knowledge about bee pollen to share with me?

What's normal for a bee sting?

bookish — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 18:24:29 -0800

How much swelling is normal after a bee sting? And is a lot of swelling indicative of anything troublesome? I was stung by a bee on the top of my foot yesterday, near my big toe. It's been gradually swelling and now the whole front half of my foot is swollen, painful and itchy, and it hurts to stand or walk. I had periodic chills after getting stung but they disappeared by yesterday evening.

Is this within the range of "normal" reactions to a bee sting? Some googling turns up advice to see a doctor if the swelling is bigger than several inches, but then elsewhere folks say it's not a big deal, if you don't have hives, a fever, or trouble breathing.

The pain is a bitch but I can deal. What concerns me is that my mother had a deathly bee allergy and once almost died while she was mowing the lawn, and I wander if this is a harbinger of more serious allergic responses in the future. Or am I just being paranoid?

I really would like to avoid the doctor, as I have no insurance and no money. Like, I would have to borrow money to go to the local clinic before my next pay check, or else show up at the ER. And I'm not going to do that if all the doc is going to say is, "Yep, that's a bee sting, take some Benedryl."

Looking for a quote about bees, sex, and life

ascetic — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 14:59:02 -0800

I once read a poem, or possibly a quote, about a bee pollinating flowers and how it was so beautiful and I think they even maybe connected it to sex and/or the essence of life. Does anyone know the name or author of this?

Don't Short Me, Bro!

gjc — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 06:45:41 -0800

How does short selling stocks harm the underlying company? To my way of thinking, it shouldn't. But Samantha Bee on the Daily Show seems to think it does. Earlier this week she did a piece about the short sellers and made them out to be among the bad guys in the current financial storm.

But I don't see how this hurts the companies that the stocks are in. Unless those companies are somehow leveraged to their own stock, which seems like a not so good idea regardless of what happens.

A hypothetical, as I understand it: XYZ Corp. decides to go public. They sell a bunch of shares in the company. They take the cash, and give up slices of ownership. Once the original purchaser buys that stock, that original purchaser can do with it what they please. It's out of the hands of XYZ Corp. Now, I decide XYZ Corp.'s stock is going to go down, and I want to make money off of that. Say it's at $20. I find someone holding stock who is willing to let me borrow it for a while. I borrow that stock and sell it at $20. Now, time comes that I need to give the stock back to who I borrowed it from. Lucky for me, the stock is down to $10, so I buy the stock back and return it. And I've doubled my money. But XYZ Corp. isn't involved in that process. The only loser in this scenario is the clown who decided to sell their stock at $10. And they are only losers if they bought the stock for more than $10. If they bought it for $5, there are no losers in that scenario.

What am I missing? Or, is she wrong?

(Obviously, this assumes the people doing the short selling aren't engaging in market manipulations. They are doing it on the up and up, within the rules.)

Geography Bee

iconjack — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 17:34:42 -0800

Looking for Geography Bee questions online. We're solid on world geography, so we're looking for material that concentrates on the US.

Non-English spelling bees?

strangeguitars — Sat, 31 May 2008 08:18:46 -0800

Do non-English-speaking countries hold spelling bees? Or is it unique to English because our spelling is so screwed that mastering it becomes a skill worthy of national competition?

How do you say Melissa in _______?

mds35 — Sat, 29 Sep 2007 05:10:22 -0800

How do you say honey bee in __________? I'm in need of translations of "honey bee" in every language I can find. If you speak another language, please do help! My wife's name is Melissa, which means "honey bee." We have son whose middle name is a sly reference to his father. We'd like our next child to have a middle name that refers to his/her mother and are hoping that in some tongue or other, the word for honey bee sounds good as a name without being too similar to Melissa.

What bit me?

otherwordlyglow — Wed, 30 May 2007 11:32:31 -0800

What is this insect that bit me? I was driving near Mono Lake, just east of Yosemite last Friday and this insect (bee? fly? bee fly?) flew in the window of our truck and bit/stung me on the knee. After it stung me (through a pair of tights), it rolled down into the cab of the truck and didn't seem to be able to fly. After my freak-out, we pulled over and dumped it out on the road, still hobbling around in the folds of my jacket. It still couldn't fly and seemed dazed.

The sting/bite hurt a lot for a brief period of time and resulted in a small (maybe a half inch total) raised inflamed area that persisted for about 45 minutes. There didn't seem to be any sort of stinger left in my skin and after the 45 minutes or so, it disappeared. We got bored watching it and left it on the side of the road. Any ideas what it is? I've never been stung by a bee or a wasp so I don't know what that feels like though this doesn't really look like a typical bee.

Where to find "Merchants of Dream" by Bee Gees?

fac21 — Fri, 04 May 2007 16:24:23 -0800

Where can I find a copy of the bootleg called "Merchants of Dream" by the Bee Gees? I've been searching my file-sharing sources for weeks with no luck. Thanks.

Is raw honey from a beehive safe to eat?

afx114 — Mon, 23 Apr 2007 22:36:10 -0800

Can I eat raw honey from a fallen beehive? A beehive fell out of a palm tree in front of my apartment today. There are no more bees, except for a few caucuses laying around. The honeycomb is quite heavy and soaked with honey, but it's black and tar-like. Is it edible? If so, what's the best way of extracting the honey from the comb?

Help me be a worker bee

jamie939 — Mon, 17 Jul 2006 15:34:29 -0800

I start a new job next week at a local newspaper in the production end of ad sales...ie. design. This will be the first time I've worked in three years. I dumbed down my resume a lot to get the job, which I really want. It's in a small town, which I moved to three years ago and the paper publishes twice a week....small town....really small town. I used to work at a high profile 24 hour Cable News Network located in Atlanta, GA, which shall remain nameless, wink. wink, in a very stressful, high responsibility position... My question is how do I transform into a worker bee at this new job, which is what the job descrition is, instead of being the crazed, whacked out, stressed out, power player that I used to be? I left the job in Atlanta because I hated what I had become....A person not a lot of people liked....It was not that I am a bad person but was pushed into management positions to make critical decisions that made a lot of people unhappy....or ego's bruised....usually the latter...It's that kind of company.

So, here I sit. Starting a new job that could be called the "Mayberry Gazette" for all practical purposes, and want to just be a worker bee....How do I quell the instinct I have to take over every project, make it perfect, and stress everyone out in the process....ie...to not be the alpha center on everything, and every subject and every detail.

Help finding a bee decoration

jbradley — Mon, 25 Jul 2005 09:48:58 -0800

A friend of mine is starting a catering business focusing on sweets. She has decided that her theme for her menus, business cards, etc will be an in-motion bee. She would like to continue this theme to her desserts as kind of a signature. Any ideas where to find bulk quantities of a tastefully rendered bee that would look appropriate attached to, or set along side, a dessert. I'm picturing something the size of a quarter or half-dollar. Thanks in advance!

How do I get rid of a bees' nest in the top of a tree?

waldo — Sun, 17 Apr 2005 13:11:58 -0800

At the top of a 50' tree hanging over our house, there is a very large (perhaps 1' by 2') bees' nest. Enough bees live there that it's become quite a problem for us. It is impossible to climb anywhere close to where it is. How can we get it down? We live on 24 acres of forested mountain property -- solutions that might bother the neighbor or potentially injure bystanders are not likely to be a problem here. We're tired of getting stung, and we'd like to be able to sit out on our porch, now that it's spring. I've read up on the actual process of dealing with a nest, it's just reaching it that's the problem here.