Buzz From Readers

"I don't know who you are, but this page is amazing and painfully spot on. It somehow makes local government both readable and terrifying."

"Your posts are absolutely hilarious. Keep it up. I laugh, then immediately get angry, which I assume is the intended experience."

"This is some much-needed comedy for the area. Also some much-needed accountability, which is somehow even rarer."

"Whoever you are, you are flipping spectacular. Thank you!!!!!"

"Thank you for forcing us to dig our heads out of the sand. A fictional bee should not be this much better at civic communication than actual elected officials, and yet."

"People are taking note. You caught my attention and I'm rarely on social media. I basically only look at Instagram now to see your posts. The issues you point out have been causing real concern for a long time. Something needs to change in Bedford. I'm offering my help, physically and financially."

"I've lived in Bedford for eleven years and never really understood what was happening at town hall. I do now. A bee explains it better than any public official ever has. I find that funny and slightly horrifying."

"Everyone in my circle is loving these posts. Have yet to hear a single negative comment. You've become the unofficial evening briefing in this town."

"I've been trying to get people engaged with local government for years. Town halls, newsletters, op-eds — nothing stuck. You did it with a fictional bee and some well-placed sarcasm. That is either brilliant or deeply indicting of the rest of us. Probably both."

"Thank you for caring. It's really well done and genuinely impressive. Funny is easy. Funny and informed is not."

"This is a genuine public service. Local democracy only functions when people are paying attention, and most people aren't — because nobody has made it interesting. You made it interesting. That matters more than you probably know."

"What I keep coming back to is that this has nothing to do with politics in the usual sense. You're not pushing a party. You're just documenting that the people in charge aren't taking the job seriously. That lands differently. It should exist everywhere."

"I'm not from Bedford. Never been there. My town has the exact same problems — unresponsive board, half-baked projects, consultants everywhere — and nobody here is paying attention. Could you do something like this for us? I'm completely serious. I would contribute financially."

"What you are saying needs to be said, and it is ridiculous that no one does it but you. I'm thrilled. I'm proud of you, for whatever that means. I hope you become president someday, which I realize would create several constitutional issues."

"The thing that gets me is that it's funny AND it works. Satire about local government usually just preaches to the converted. This actually reaches people who weren't paying attention and makes them care. That's genuinely rare."

"I've never loved an account the way I love this one. It is genuinely deranged how invested I am in this bee."

"Every night at dinner, my husband, my daughter, and I read your latest posts out loud. We look forward to it every night. Thank you for giving our family a truly bizarre but cherished tradition."

"We support your efforts and look forward to seeing your posts, with trepidation of course, for fear that we are the ones getting stung next. Thank you."

"I'm in a text thread with a few Bedford families and we share your posts every day and cackle out loud. It has become a full secondary communications network."

"We just moved here and found your account. It's the greatest thing I've ever seen. We share it with friends in another state and now they follow you too. That should not make sense, but it does."

"Someone shared one of your posts with me and I am now addicted. I came for one joke and now I know too much about local governance."