On a Wing & a Scare - Part 1 (September 2010)

One morning around 3:00 A.M. last June, I was minding my own business, sleeping, when a strange noise woke me up. It went like this: FLAP, flap, FLAP. I knew what it was without looking. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, there was a bat in my bedroom. So I did what any normal, self-respecting person alone in the house would do when a bat wakes them up at 3:00 A.M. I grabbed my glasses and the bedspread, closed the door behind me and ran downstairs.

I immediately called my husband, not because he was a man, but because I knew he would be awake at 3:00 A.M. (Mind you, if I thought my mother would have been up, I might have called her instead.)

Our conversation went something like this:

“Mich, I said, “There’s a bat in the house.”

“What do you want me to do about it?” he said. “I’m at work.”

“I don’t know,” I answered. “I just thought you should know.”

I noted not only a distinct lack of alarm, but also sympathy in his voice. Great. We talked for a few minutes. I calmed down and we devised a plan. The plan was I would sleep on the couch the rest of the night with my cell phone at my side. Mich would call at 5:30 to wake me.

The plan went off flawlessly. I got another two hours of sleep and awoke relatively aware if not exactly well-rested. I went about my usual morning routine – shower, internet, breakfast, blow-dry hair and...then…well, and then I hit a snag. The next step in the routine is “and got dressed for work.” The snag was all the clothes I needed for work were in the bedroom. You know, where the bat could be. (Never mind the bat could have easily escaped into the wider house through the bottom of the door.) I doubted the old t-shirt I was wearing would be acceptable in the office.

Somehow, I was going to have to enter the bedroom. But not in just a t-shirt. Hm. What to do, what to do? Standing in the living room, I looked around until my eyes fell on my fencing equipment. Aha! I pulled on my fencing pants – my green, yellow, and burgundy striped fencing pants. My arms were still bare, though, and it was just warm enough that I didn’t want to pull on my heavy fencing shirt. I scanned the room again and found the perfect thing to protect my arms – a black cardigan with hot pink trim. I pulled that on, put my fencing mask over my head, gloves on my hands, grabbed my sword for good measure and proceeded upstairs.