Bats in My Belfry

So last night at about 2:30 in the morning, Diva woke up crying because she’d had a bad dream. I went in her room and she told me that she had dreamt that a butterfly was flying around her room and she woke up and it was real. I tried to calm her down, but then she pointed up to the ceiling, “See, there it is again!” and I just about died.

It most certainly wasn’t a butterfly. And it took the thing flying through a couple of times for me to realize what it was. There was a bat flying around our house!

First I had Diva tell me when it had flown back out of her room, then I realized there were still two other rooms the thing could fly through and it needed to be OUT of my house.

So I opened the door again and immediately dropped down to the floor, all commando style and crawled back into my bedroom.

“Umm, CB?”

Half-mumble, “Yeah?”

“I think there’s a bat in the house.” I was amazed at my calmness.

“So?”

“So, will you take care of it, please?”

“I’m not dealing with it tonight.”

At this point every curse word known to man ran through my head. “Please? There is no way that I will be able to sleep knowing that thing is flying around. Besides, I think its landed over there.”

He mumbles a few more inaudible words (surely cursing me the way I had been cursing him) and gets up. I took Diva in my room and got back on my bed. Then the bat started flying in our room too. I screamed like a little girl every time it did its little swooping circle thing. And I stayed under the blanket until he told me that he’d smacked it and thought it was dead.

Then I woke CJ up too and told him what was going on. And I had the kids bring their sleeping bags in our room so we could close the door.

CB went downstairs to get something to get the bat with and I swallowed down my shrieks so I could stand watch and make sure the dumb thing didn’t fly away again.

He came back with gloves on and a bag to put it in. And our Swiffer with the extendable handle. He used that to push the bat out from underneath the radiator.

The damn thing was still alive! It started squeaking this horrid squeak and I was back under the covers in no time. But CB had it held down with the Swiffer and was laughing because it kept trying to bite it. Yes. Really funny, dear.

He finally got the thing in a bag, so he took it outside and beat it profusely with a two by four.

Everyone was wide awake for quite some time, giggling and talking now that the bat was safely out of our house.

I’m tired as hell and am just hoping to make it through today without falling asleep.

Edited to add: A little disclaimer. I don't often think before I speak. Which means that I often don't think before I post either. It didn't dawn on my that not everyone would just automatically know that we don't usually go off a-killin' around here. In fact the last three (yes three. Did I mention that I hate this house?) times we've dealt with a bat in here, we've let it go on about it's merry way. Because like Cat said, they eat mosquitoes. Lots of them. And since people in this state call the mosquitoe our "unofficial state bird", the Good Lord knows there are a plethora of those little bloodsuckers around. I just think that CB was frustrated and tired and he took it out on the bat. Plus, they have rabies and are scary and I do NOT want them in my house. So the duct tape should save anymore bats from meeting the same fate. I'm sorry if it offended anyone, but that's the way it goes sometimes.