Bat in the Belfrey

For those of you with run-of-the-mill, boring lives, you really need to come spend a day or two at our house - the activities never do slow down around these parts. Tonight I heard a frantic wailing from Little Chic that there was a bird flying around the living room while she was watching TV. This did not surprise me immensely because this morning I woke to a dead one in my bathroom, it's feathers spread from stem to stern. Apparently when I let the dog in (without wearing my contacts) she snuck past me with a treasure.

As I darted out to see just what kind of bird we had tonight, I quickly recognized the gliding and fluttering that only a bat makes. Since we've already had the family bonding experience of all getting a full set of rabies shots, that's not really on our list of summer excitement again. So I quickly herded Little Chic, HyperDog and Monsterpaw into my bedroom and closed the door. Brainy Boy, usually the alarmist, thought it was pretty funny to have a bird in the house, so I decided to let him continue taking his bath in ignorance--otherwise I'd be chasing a bat and a boy. Meanwhile HyperDog was having a fit at being left out of the hunting action.

I made a quick call to Hero Guy to get home (he was on a rescue squad call) and I proceeded to use a flyswatter to try to guide the critter to its natural outdoor home. I turned on all the lights except for the ones where I wanted the bat to stay, and closed all the bedroom doors. The open style of our house still gave him ample room to fly to and fro throughout several rooms. Having vaulted ceilings didn't make it easy enough for me to reach him, but it made it a lot freakier when he would swoop past my head as I stood on the balcony overlooking his flight pattern.

By the time Hero Guy arrived, the bat had landed on our stone fireplace, clutching for his dear life. Hero Guy made a quick entrance with a BB gun and proceeded to lodge five BBs at various places in our tongue-in-groove ceiling, wounding the bat, and thoroughly ticking it off. Hero Guy had the nerve to suggest that my flash photography was irritating the bat, rather than his constant pelting BBs at the poor thing. After realizing the sight on the gun was not accurate, he switched to a different BB gun and followed the bat into my kitchen where the bat apparently felt safer buried in my grapevine surrounding the kitchen window. Hero Guy took one shot with the second gun, downed the bat and convinced himself it was indeed a faulty sight, not a faulty aim. He does pride himself on being an excellent marksman after all.

Now the gloved hands have been cleaned, the kitchen counter (where the bat plopped) has been Cloroxed and the bat has been discarded. We'll be leaving the BBs where they are for posterity, I'm sure. Hero Guy wouldn't have it if I tried to remove them. And, I only made one teeny-tiny shriek the entire time, which is more than I can say for Hero Guy!