A man's home is his castle until it is invaded by creatures that really don't belong there like frogs, lizards, snakes, birds or bats. And therein starts our story.
I found it distasteful to have earwigs (from the insect order Dermaptera) crawl out of the toothpaste rinse glass just before I started to rinse.
Equally as bad is a spider hanging from the ceiling right over your head just before you turn out the light to go to sleep or the mosquito that never makes a sound until you are in the grey area of fuzzy sleep and you hear that high-pitched "zzzzzz" in your ear.
I tried to kill that mosquito by slapping the side of my head with my open hand _ I was deaf for about an hour in that ear. The mosquito died "¦ laughing. (He had a weak heart.)
We have solved most of the problems by using the advertised electronic gizmos that emit sounds only a mother could love. (Occasionally we get a mouse in a trap wearing a hearing aid but for the most part we are a "clean house.")
I was playing bridge with my computer (and winning) when I heard a shriek from the kitchen.
"There's an ugly looking creature in here," Diane announced in a voice that said, "You'd better get in here fast if you want a wife here in the morning."
As I entered the kitchen area I started looking for a weapon _ which is difficult if you have no idea what you are going to face. "It's by the cellar door," Diane said.
I slowly started to look around the china closet fully expecting to have something leap at me. There in the corner of the cellar door was a brown-black lump the size of a large bar of soap.
It was a bat. If it was Count Dracula, he hadn't been Sanforized and had been in the water too long.
He kept making clicking noises, which I think indicated he was angry _ angry enough to be rabid, I thought?
"We need something to drop over him to isolate and contain him," I announced.
My wife handed me an empty baked-bean can from the recycle bin. For me to get the bat in the can, I was going to have to ask the bat if he would fold his wings enough so I could squeeze him in. By the sounds he was making I could sense that this was not an option. "I need something larger," I said. Diane got me an empty 21/2-quart plastic ice cream container complete with lid. "Now you're talking business" I said, "Just drop the whole thing over him and trap him underneath."
"Why don't you do it?" she asked. "I have bad knees and can't bend that far," I replied.
She carefully approached the bat, and ever so slowly put the plastic container over the bat. Slipping a piece of cardboard between the bat and the floor and doing a fancy flip of the wrist the bat was imprisoned in a plastic jail complete with holes in the cover so he could breathe,
Hearts racing we looked at each other and said "We got him." The question became what do we do with him? Better yet, what if our little friend was rabid? Surely coming into our house was out of the ordinary. We started calling friends who might have a clue. On the first call I stated that I had a bat in my house and the response was, "That's no way to talk about your wife." Finally we called 911 and explained the situation. Since it was after hours the dispatcher said he would call the person in charge of emergencies and she would get back to us.
A short while later we got a call from the health emergencies department in Otsego County and she took down all our information, including how my wife, Diane, wrestled the creature to a standstill and was able to entrap the bat and how we had it subdued and securely tied with 1/2-inch line.
Since no one had come in contact with the bat or had been bitten on the neck there was no need to take him in for rabies detection (I would have thought that the strange circumstances of the bat-in-the-house would warrant further exploration, but no, the bat was ours).
The lady said that we should kill the bat and put him in double freezer bags and bury him at least 3 feet down and not closer than 75 feet of water. The question became "How do we kill the bat?"
If we wanted to give him a sporting chance we could throw him in the air and use him as a clay pigeon at a turkey shoot. Or we could give him a running start before cranking up the dirt bike.
We left him in the plastic jail and when we checked in the morning he had expired. I think it was suicide.
Although no autopsy was performed we think that he threw himself against his plastic wall until he went "batty." (If you thought that was bad I have a million more.)
As time goes by, the bat will get larger with each retelling of the story. "Did grandpa ever tell you how he captured a six-foot bat single-handed? Well it was like this, it was a dark stormy night ..."
Henry Geerken is a three-time NYSUT award-winner writing humorous articles addressing retiree and senior citizen concerns. He can be reached by e-mail at hgeerken@stny.rr.com.
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