My Friend Jasper

I have a pet wasp. Let me remind you that I live far in the Northern hemisphere, and that, until yesterday, it was February. But still, a wasp appeared on my Aloe Vera plant while I was meditating. Well, I say it appeared - it appeared to me. It may have been on the plant for some time already. Something seemed out of the ordinary in my peripheral vision, so a looked directly at the plant and leaned forward slightly. It still took a few seconds for the blob to shape itself into an insect and still longer for me to realise that it was an ordinary wasp - a yellowjacket as they're called Stateside.

But this is by far an ordinary time for a wasp to be sitting on one's Aloe Vera. I left it there, rather than chuck it out into the cold. Last night, as I was drinking a glass of wine, sitting near the aforementioned plant, my fiddling hand behind my back picked up a small light object. I wondered what it was, and my speculation did not extend to wasps, so I was not alarmed. After a few moment of holding the thing I raised my hand to my face to check. Arg! It's a wasp! I flicked it onto the floor. Then I decided I didn't really want a sleepy insect with a nasty sting crawling around my house, so I captured it and put it into a large preserve jar. I added a broken grape, which it soon attached itself too, though whether as food or potential friend, I am unsure.

I wonder what is the longest anybody has kept wasps in captivity. As someone who killed hundreds of wasps with great relish as a child, I feel obliged to look after this one. I read that they like protein-rich foods at Spring-time, so I'll visit the butcher and ask for "one gram of your finest fillet steak". Nothing but the best for my new friend.