A few weeks ago, I spent my Sunday (three hours and ten minutes of it, anyway) in a one-hour beekeeping atelier at the Parc de la Villette.  On my way there I wondered who would go to a beekeeping class.  Sundays in France are usually sacred.  They are typically spent eating roasted chicken and chestnuts with grandparents, great aunts and uncles.  If you don't have extended family with which to spend the day, you're a bit of an outcast.  A weirdo.  I felt a little guilty for leaving my family at home for the day, but the beekeeping atelier is only held on two or three Sundays a year and they fill up quickly.  I went because when am I ever going to get the chance to do hobby beekeeping?  But more importantly, I was promised to return home with a pot of honey.  My very own honey.  I hear the word "beekeeping" and I think honey. 

There were thirteen of us in the class.  The park employee, who chaperoned us throughout the class, walked us behind a locked gate and into a walled garden where we met Head Beekeeper, an older man whose life passion, it turns out, is bees.  We sat around long picnic tables under what looked like a makeshift Boy Scout shelter.  I got out my camera.  Everyone else got out a pad of paper and a pen for note taking.  Note taking? 

I looked around the table at the freak show that surrounded me.   

Did you know that the average beehive contains 20,000 to 30,000 bees? 

There was the May of '68, hippie-never-turned-yuppie couple with their matching long gray hair, thick two-for-one black-rimmed glasses and terrible, terrible taste in fashion.  No, we don't wear Birkenstocks anymore.  No, turquoise jewelry is not in.  And no, men do not wear bandana headbands. 

There was the crazy woman who never stopped humming or singing.  Not even when Head Beekeeper was talking.  Part of me admires people who can ignore social norms and go about their day as if they were living in a musical.  I wish I could do that.  I wish that I could periodically break out in song and dance and have total strangers around me join in, somehow already knowing the lyrics and choreography.  And the lyrics would always be so clever, so apt and always rhyme.  But I know that will never happen. 

So far, Humming Lady was in the lead for Craziest in Class-our Summa Cum Laude of crazy.

That is, until the dork sitting directly across from me opened his mouth. 

Did you know, he asks me, that when the queen lays her eggs, those that she chooses to fertilize become male and those that she chooses not to fertilize become female?  No, I had no idea.  Instead of answering, I decided to smile and nod.

It is glaringly obvious that this gentleman sitting across from me has never been laid.  Ever.  He's probably 45.  Ugly as homemade sin.  Could stand to bulk up by at least 30 pounds.  Needs a massive personality overhaul and a makeover.  Has absolutely no social skills.  During Head Beekeeper's one-hour lecture, Never Been Laid Boy kept interjecting thoughts, opinions, and tidbits of trivia on all things related to bees.  He knew everything about bees.  Colony habits.  Colony reaction to inclement weather.  The structure of the De Layens trough hive.  Everything. 

He looks up at me and asks, Did you know that bees date from the early Cretaceous period, but over time evolved so now they have a stinger? 

Overly eager to share his knowledge, he was upstaged only by the woman sitting directly to my right-Never Been Laid Girl.  Ever.  She's probably 45.  Ugly as homemade sin.  Could stand to bulk up by at least 30 pounds.  Needs a massive personality overhaul and a makeover.  Has absolutely no social skills.  She shares Never Been Laid Boy's sole passion in life-bees. 

Did you know that when the female worker bee is born, she immediately starts cleaning the hive?  From Day One. 

Head Beekeeper passed around parts of a beeless De Layens beehive box.  One of the hanging wooden frames had an old, dried up hive.  Never Been Laid Girl hands it to me, pointing out the largest hole, explaining to me that this is where the queen lived.  She was so excited she could barely contain herself.  I almost told her, you know, the queen bee ain't really royalty.  Instead, I smile and nod. 

Never Been Laid Boy tells me the average queen lives for one to two years; an exceptional queen lives up to seven years.  I want to ask what makes her exceptional?  Benevolent treatment of subjects?  Diplomatic skills on state visits to other hives?  Instead, I smile and nod. 

After an hour of listening to a highly technical lecture on bees full of French words that I did not know (that's right folks, I was too much of an idiot to even think about bringing a dictionary with me since I knew the words for bee and honey and thought that was enough), it was time to play dress-up.  I chose the overgrown Umpa Lumpa costume.  All the Frenchies chose the Michelin Man costumes.  Of course, the Umpa Lumpa costume and the Michelin Man costumes were identical-it's just a matter of perception. 

Did you know that the Michelin Man actually has a name?  Bibendum.

As we zip up, Never Been Laid Boy tells me the reason we wear white is so we don't look like brown bears trying to steal their honey.  I almost tell him not to worry, those bees is so smart they'll catch on soon that people dressed in white are just as much of an enemy as bears dressed in brown.  Instead, I smile and nod. 

Head Beekeeper set a small fire in a metal can.  I have absolutely no idea what's going on now.  Are we going to smoke the bees out?  Geez, won't that make them mad?  Like really, really mad?  Like as mad as bees?  Mad enough to, say, attack us?  Is this Umpa Lumpa material woven tightly enough to block the stingers?  

Never Been Laid Boy tells me the smoke actually has a calming effect on the bees.  This calming effect makes them want to eat and they'll start looking for food.  That way, we can stand around the beehive, stealing their honey, and they won't even notice.  Smile and nod. 

Did you know, he asks me, that when bees get hungry and start to feed, their abdomens distend, making it impossible for them to sting?  Smile and nod. 

It is finally one hour and ten minutes into a one-hour atelier, time to open up one of the De Layens beehives.  You can feel the excitement buzzing in the air.  Bees start flying out.  Disoriented from the fumier.  It may be difficult to visualize 30,000 bees buzzing around in a small area.  It looks like gently falling snow all around. 

Snowflakes with stingers. 

I see bees land and crawl around on the Bibendum clones all around and then it dawns on me that perhaps they're not discriminating against me the Umpa Lumpa.  I can feel them walking around on my back.  I can feel myself starting to panic.  Wait a minute.  Aren't I scared of bees?  Yes.  Yes, I am.  My whole life.  I take a quick mental tally of what I'm afraid of.  Bees, spiders and snakes.  That and plane crashes.  But when you have kids, you have to pretend like you're scared of nothing.  I've been pretending like I'm scared of nothing for seven years now and here I am, without my kids, surrounded by 30,000 bees.  Crud.  I really am not liking this.  I am surrounded by crazies and I'm on the verge of out-crazying them by having a little mental breakdown inside my Umpa Lumpa suit. 

For some reason, my mind flashes to a story about G. Gordon Liddy.  I have no idea if this is true, but supposedly he used to be scared of thunderstorms.  In an attempt to get over his fear, he tied himself to a tree during a thunderstorm one evening, forcing himself to face his fear.  This was my G. Gordon Liddy moment.  I found my inner strength.  To answer the obvious question: yes, next I plan to recruit my own personal militia.  I will base them in Switzerland. 

A man in our atelier got stung.  He screamed, which brought me back from my G. Gordon Liddy daydream to the 30,000 bees buzzing around my head.  Head Beekeeper looked at him in scorn, letting out a hair-raising whisper:  do not scream around the bees! 

Did you know, asks Never Been Laid Boy, that not screaming around the bees is your first line of defense?  The Umpa Lumpa costume is your second.  The fumier is your third.

For an hour, we stood around playing with the beehives.  Never Been Laid Girl was deemed "the assistant" and she spent the entire hour actually holding a beehive, excitedly pointing out where the queen lives.  Frantic bees would crawl up her hands and she was totally cool with it.  She found three larvae that were, as she said, "being born" and everyone stood around watching the birth of new, precious life. 

Did you know that the average lifespan of a worker bee is six weeks?

After everyone had their fill of bees and beehives and after we had stolen three of the wooden frames, it was time to take off our Umpa Lumpa/Bibendum costumes.  The chaperone led us and our beehives (along with some stray bees) to a nearby building. 

It was the start of hour number three of the one-hour atelier.  It was time to "make" the honey. 

To extract the honey, you perch a hive on a special table and uncap the cells with a special uncapping knife.  We each took a turn with the knife.  We had to scrape off the surface of the beehive.  It was finally my turn.  I put too much pressure on the knife and accidentally cut into the hive.  Never Been Laid Girl ran over, shook her finger at me and yelled: stop, stop, stop, stop, stop!  Arrêtez!  Mais, arrêtez! C'est le miel là!.  I want to reply that yes, I am a deficient beehive cell uncapper, but at least I've been laid before!  Instead, I smile and nod.

At three hours and ten minutes, I finally had my little pot of honey.  Head Beekeeper and his fellow enthusiasts were knee-deep in beekeeping discussion.  And as much as I wanted to grab Never Been Laid Boy and Never Been Laid Girl and say:  Dudes, wake up, here's your soul mate.  Go get a hotel room.  Mate.  Make socially dysfunctional, bee-loving babies together, I just had to get away from there.  It had started to feel like a kidnapping situation.  Like some cult that invites you in for a lovely spot of tea and you realize that you've been there for a week and you don't know where the exit is. 

I quietly slunk to the back of the room, found the door, and ran out.  Made a beeline for the Metro. 

And did you know that most bees never get laid?  Ever?  Over the course of her entire life, the queen bee mates with about a dozen male bees.  All dozen in the same sunny summer afternoon early during her rule.  She stores their sperm for the next one to two years (or seven if she is "exceptional").  Then when she lays eggs, she can choose to fertilize the egg or not.  But after that memorable daylong group orgy involving only thirteen of the 30,000 bees, ain't nobody in that beehive getting laid.  Ever.