To bee or not to bee? Yesterday afternoon a small London bookstore was more than surprised to find an unusual gift left behind by a customer wearing a blue jacket.
if you were or are the friendly gent (blue coat) who was in the shop half an hour ago and left a big jar of bees on the table in the poetry section, please come back and reclaim your jar of bees. if you aren't, please rt until we find him #FindTheBeeGent
— LRB Bookshop (@LRBbookshop) March 16, 2019
The hunt for the mysterious “Bee Gent” began at the London Review Bookshop when the rather confused staff found an abandoned jar of bees on a table in the poetry section of their store. All they remembered about the customer was that he seemed like a “friendly gent” in a blue coat. That’s when they took to Twitter to locate the owner of the bee jar.
— Die Hard Three really, really (@diehardthree) March 16, 2019
Soon, Twitter was buzzing with responses to the bizarre incident. People wanted to know more about what was at stake, here—and they also wanted an excuse to break out the arsenal of puns.
Make them freebees.
— Jan Norton (@pollygarter) March 16, 2019
So you’re using the hive mind to solve this?
— Rachel FaberMachacha (@Rachel_F_M) March 16, 2019
Classic honeytrap
— Alyson Hunt (@VictorianAlyson) March 16, 2019
charlie says they're too large to be bees but i've started the hashtag now so it's too late to change it
— LRB Bookshop (@LRBbookshop) March 16, 2019
Even if the insects are too large to be bees, at least the Internet didn’t miss an opportunity to find humor in this once-in-a-lifetime situation.