Bats In Our Belfry... Er, Master Bedroom

So, last night ended as usual. We headed to bed, anticipating we'd have to postpone our camping trip by one day due to snow in the mountains. I read a bit, Bryan watched a little TV, then lights out.

I heard a scuffle & asked Bryan if he'd heard it to. "Nope, I don't hear anything." So we lay there bit longer and I heard the scuffle again - this time Bryan seemed a bit more alert. I asked, "What's wrong?". He responded sarcastically that he was starting to hear what I hear and that it was probably a giant centipede hanging off the ceiling fan, ready to pounce. I slowly turned on the light and peeked at the fan, then glanced around the room. I didn't see anything and said so and flipped off the light. Bryan responded - nothing but that bat hanging on the wall. Flip - the light came back on. I still saw nothing until one of the knot-holes on one of the beams stretched out its wing.

Terrific! Now, I love bats, I think they are fascinating but not necessarily in my bedroom. We quietly got out of bed, grabbed our robes, shut the interior doors and opened the exterior doors. I went to get a couple of brooms so we could quickly & quietly shoo him out the door.

Well there was nothing quick or quiet about it. I sounded like I was shooing cattle until I'd break out in giggles (the bat was quite the flyer, circling around and around and around - thus I spun like a top too...) Bryan spent most of the time trying to trap Bat in a laundry basket and cursing like a sailor. About 30 minutes later, we got Bat out the sliding door, just to have him swoop right back in (guess it was warmer where we were than outside, that bat was no dummy). It took another 10-15 minutes to get him back outside and the door slammed shut. Whew! Success.

We got back in bed and I scratched the top of my head and felt... something... yep, Bryan confirmed: Bat Poop! LOVELY... so as flashes of me dying of the hanta virus flipped thru my head, I washed out my hair, washed my hands... and headed back to bed.

I hope we didn't make the poor little bat use all of its energy flying around the room so that it froze last night. He was a cute little fellow - I didn't get a photo as the camera was in the truck in anticipation of our trip that we will postpone a day or so - very small (3-4"), brown, furry... very cute... until he crapped in my hair!