A hammer story

When I first came North, I'm talking about literally the first two days. I flew from Halifax to Toronto,2 hours on the ground then on to edmonton, 2 hours on the ground then on to yellowknife, 15 minutes on the ground then on to Norman Wells. I was nervous about moving away from home, scared shitless about flying and excited about a new life all at the same time...soooo I drank my face off- straight thru to Norman Wells. My buddy met me at the airport and we went back to his house for a very late supper and a few last beers. It was past midnight and still broad daylight which was unnerving.
My buddy Kirk told me at about three thirty in the morning that i would be flying out on a "bush" plane in the morning to Fort Norman to start work- "what?!!??"
I wanted to sleep for a week, but I got up and got to the plane on time. About twenty minutes later I'm on the ground meeting my new employer. Straight to the job site. Straight up the scaffolding, three tiers. I'm holding up the faschia, the long straight piece of wood that hangs under the eaves at the edge of the roof, while the other guy is nailing it in place. he's taking his time. It's a nice sunny day. It's warm. the birds are singing the bees are buzzing around. Sure seems like a lot of bees up here, some of them are pretty big too. So I'm standing there, my left arm up over my head holding up this piece of wood, the other arm hanging loosely at my side, with my brand new 18oz. framing hammer in my hand.
Suddenly there's this knifing pain in my left shoulder- in a milisecond I glance down and see this HUGE "Bee" on my shoulder. Instinct takes over I swing to swat at the thing(had to be a right hand swing, I was holding the fashcia in my left) Of course, still had that framing hammer in my mitt when I swung at the bug-"THWAAACK!!!" That hammer hit me in the head, as hard as I could swing it. Off the scaffold I go AAAAHHH!!! boom into the mud and wet moss. Head pounding, shoulder bleeding. I look up at the other guy on the scaffold and he says"you had a bulldog on your shoulder."
That frigging thing was as big as my thumb, and took an enormous divot of flesh when it took off.
The guy tells me that everywhere else they would be called a horsefly. NOT BLOODY LIKELY!
But that's what it was, a bulldog. The northern steroidal version.
It's funny but everytime a hammer goes flying by(or into) my head I think about that story.
Thanks to my wife for inspiring this post(via the hammer)and helping me tidy up the mess.