Batty Batty Batty Bat

Do you remember the Count? It was because of him that my eldest child never really got into Sesame Street - he was afraid of the Count. (On a side note, have you ever seen the Count censored on YouTube? It would be offensive if it wasn't so darn funny- although I think I offended my brother when I showed it to him, but that is irrelevant to my story.)

How about the Batty Batty song with the dancing bats? That creeped him out too. I've never been particularly creeped out by bats myself. Until today. Until today you see, they've just fascinated me--they swoop out at night and gobble the mosquitos in our yard (I think I need more bats--I think Elliot needs his own personal bat escort). But I've never really gotten a look at one up close, in action. Until today.

That's not necessarily true. The other day I was helping open up some summer cabins and as I rolled up the outer vinyl window coverings, I unconvered, much to their surprise as well as mine, a couple of sleeping bats. They mostly just hung there, upside down, then quietly disappeared when everyone was no longer looking at them. Bats are subtle. Maybe that's what's always intrigued me--subtlety is not my forte.

But today, things changed.

I was in the kitchen and my husband came over with a bit of an anxious look on his face and said, can you come here please? I was concerned. His next sentence began with "don't freak out." And I realized what was wrong. When he works on a critter in the house, he gets a sort of anxious bemused look on his face when he approaches me about it because he knows that although I can deal with a lot of stuff, uninvited critters in my house freak me out. Dead or alive, but especially dead. But you see, his face had the anxious quality, but was lacking the bemusement. This told me that he was freaked out himself.

My eyes darted over to the sofa in the living room where he had been sitting. There, just under the edge of the curtain on the carpet, I saw something moving.

What is it.

A bat.

In broad daylight? In the house?! In the Living Room?!?!

The questions were swimming in my mind.

How did it get in? How long has it been there? How the heck did it get in here? And why hasn't the cat discovered it? And who's going to get rid of it.

Well, the poop around it proved it had been there a while, well long enough to poop anyway. It wasn't flying, it just appeared to be nervously pacing behind the curtain, like waiting in the wings for it's stage entrance.

Matt called maintenance. Conveniently, on a Saturday of a holiday weekend, no one responded.

What do we do on a Saturday morning in May with a bat in the living room?

What would you do?

We sent the boys outside for a large bucket.

I commandeered an empty cereal box as a lid and obtained a large stick.

With Ethan's help (I wasn't going near it), they cornered it and pushed it into the bucket, and covered it with the makeshift lid--but not before it bared it's teeth and stretched its wings (huge, pointy teeth . . . ).

Then, we took the thing out side (with Elliot's help) and set the bucket next to a large tree, and stepped back. After a moment, it crawled out and started climbing the tree with some sort of joyous abandon akin to sighing "ah yes, finally, tree bark, instead of that awful burber". When it reached about 10 feet up, it dove and swooped off towards a large stand of trees. In broad daylight.

I'm still intrigued and fascinated. And a little freaked out.

ONE! ONE BAT! HA HA HA HA!!!!