One day while working in the oilfield we were "breaking out" and removing old, abandoned pipelines. These were old "flow lines" and "gas lines". Natural gas has a tendency to dry out the threads of pipe and this, coupled with their age, make screwing the pipe apart very difficult. It was necessary to break the threads loose before screwing them apart with our pipe wrenches. This is done by striking the coupling a number of times with a 3 lb. hammer. The process of striking the coupling we called "warming it up".
While beating on the coupling of one connection I heard a hissing sound. I assumed that I had broken another pipe lying directly beneath the one I was working on and there was gas leaking, thus making this hissing sound. So, in order to locate the problem I began to dig and poke and beat around on the
ground in the vicinity of the noise.
Much to my surprise, my assumptions were completely wrong. That hissing sound turned out to be the noise emanating from a bumble bee nest! You see, bumble bees nest underground.
Well, this nest of bees poured out of that small hole in the ground like a whirlwind and came after me with a vengence! At that time I had a large, scraggly, awful looking "afro" which those bees tried to light into. They chased me across the field and over the hill. When, after a few minutes I tried to return, they put me over the hill again! This happened not
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