I like bats...theoretically. I know they eat tons of mosquitoes - that sounds good to me. But, when I find myself face to face with a real live bat, my heart rate quickens, I start making weird high pitch "G" noises and I bust out in a cold sweat. My first encounter occurred at age 14. I was trapped in a high school gymnasium with the exit blocked by a bat as it flip-flopped and fluttered around on the floor like a fish moving in my direction. I shrank behind a water fountain as it got closer and closer. I think someone eventually came to my rescue and chased the bat away with a baton or something.
Yesterday evening was another such encounter. I was walking the dogs when suddenly a creature flew up from the ground to about chest level approximately 2 feet from my face. Unfortunately, it was semi-trapped between me, the two leashes and the two dogs. It just kept bobbing around between my feet and chest. I pulled very hard on the dogs leashes to flee the scene but the dogs were totally not on board with my plan. After being jerked backward they started to fight with each other and further tangle the leashes and drag me back toward the crazy bat (which I had begun to believe was not all together well)
You may have noticed the Astro Escape-O-Meter has been incremented by one. You might think I weighed the options of getting bit by a rabid bat versus chasing Astro around the neighborhood and then giving him a bath.
You would be giving me too much credit.
I gripped hard on those leashes and dragged 120 lbs of canine with all my might until finally the bat moved on.
So why did I up the escape-o-meter?
Astro escaped the day before when the girls opened the door to greet a friend and the friend had opened the screen door to greet the girls. Astro saw his opening and headed for the hills. Bill recaptured him in under 5 minutes. I guess Astro was having a "senior moment".
No comments:
Post a Comment