Un-BEE-lievably Stupid!

In the hamlet of Ada, there once lived a proud farmer who built a prosperous farm with his two sons, Richie and Dougie. As the two boys grew up, their father asked them to tend to the farm's honey-bee hives which produced more than enough honey for the farm. In fact, so much honey was being produced that the farmer was able to sell the extra honey for quite a profit.

When the boys took over the operation of the bee-hives, their father advised the boys to treat the bees well. In exchange for the shelter and care that the farm provided the bees, the bees provided the farm with valuable honey, a win-win situation that the father wanted to continue.

As the boys became teenagers, their attention to the bees started to wane. "Don't worry about the bees. They always make honey...let's go play!" Dougie urged his brother Richie.

While Dougie was out playing ball and chasing girls, and Richie was campaigning for sophomore class president, the honey production started to slip. The wooden boxes that contained the bee-hives were becoming increasingly weathered and fractured, exposing the bees and their larvae to the elements.

Once the boys discovered the falling production, they knew they had to act quickly. Instead of fixing the wooden boxes that stored the hives, however, the boys used some tape to patch areas in an effort to save money. They hoped that would maintain their usual profit.

The normally resilient bees continued to suffer, and they started to scout around for a better home.

The boys were puzzled. They noticed the decrease in honey. They noticed that several bees seemed primed to leave, yet they were still reluctant to do the right thing. Instead, they asked their friend Mikey what he thought about the problem.

Mikey walked around the hives for a few moments, bent down to the ground, and picked up a fair sized stick, and struck the hives with such force that the bees were temporarily stunned. "What the heck did you do that for?" asked Steven.

"I'm sending them a message! They'll make more honey now, I bet!"

Shrugging off their initial daze, the bees streamed out of the hives, swarming all three boys and stinging them repeatedly. "Ow! Ouch! Maaaaa!" cried the boys as they ran back to the farm.

"Seems like the bees sent us a message," wailed Richie as the nursed his stings, tears running down his face.

A few hours later, the bees had settled down, but within a couple more hours, the hives were virtually empty.

Mikey, his face still marked with bee stings, stood up. "Let's go. We have got to show them who is the boss. I say we go squash 30 or so bees...one for each sting we've suffered. That will teach 'em!"

The boys were hesitant. They paused, asked Mikey to go home for a while, and then they approached their father, admitting what had happened to them at the bee hives.

Later, their father, inspecting the barren hives, shook his head in disappointment. "Boys, didn't I tell you to treat the bees well? If you want the bees to make honey, you have to keep them happy. Secondly, you would have to be a moron to take a stick to a bee hive. Don't you know that the more you swing a stick, the madder the bees will become? Worse, there are hundreds of thousands of bees in there. Were you thinking of making them all mad??"

Their heads bowed low in shame, the boys were afraid to admit that they had thought about it.