YOU KNOW YOU'RE A BEEKEEPER WHEN...

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• The windshield of your vehicle has at least two yellow dots on it.

• You have answers ready for questions about Africanized bees and the value of local honey in preventing allergies.

• You eagerly await the phone call from the post office asking you to please come pick up your bees.

• You check out all the honey labels and prices at the supermarket.

• You've estimated just how much money you spent to control mites.

• You pick up matches at restaurants, even though you don't smoke.

• Your friends and neighbors think you are the answer to every swarm and bees-in-the-wall problem.

• You are keenly aware of the first and last freezes of each winter.

• There is propolis on the steering wheel of your vehicle and the bottom of your boots.

• There is a bucket of something in your garage that can only be good for smoker fuel.

• You are called "the Bee Man," or "the Bee Lady" by a lot of people who don't know your name.

• You know the bloom period of more local flowers than the state horticulturist.

• You welcome a rainy weekend if it will stimulate nectar production.

• You don't mind driving home with a few honey bees inside your vehicle.

• Your family and friends know exactly what they're going to get for Christmas.

• You don't mow the lawn because the bees are working the weeds.

• You drive down a road and find yourself evaluating the roadside flowers for their honey-producing potential.

• You pull over and check the bees on the wildflowers just to see if they are YOUR bees, AND -- you can tell the difference.

• You come home smelling like a camp fire, and you haven't been camping.

• The school principal calls to ask that you never again let your child take a drone tied with a thread to school for show and tell.

• When you are standing at a family picnic talking to some relatives, you are the only person who doesn't duck and run when a bee starts buzzing around.

• You never stop marveling at these wonderful creatures.