Day: March 9, 2005

So, the Lady was all wrapped up in watching her tv, and Mister was off someplace, maybe in that bathroom place where the heater comes up under the sink, I like to lie there in the morning when Lady takes her shower, but what I was trying to write was that they were both doing things, you know? And so I did one of the good tricks I rarely get to do, which is stand up on my hind legs and get stuff off the counter or stove when I think noone is watching! It is so great. And I was very careful and quiet except for a little clicking of my nails, and a little jingling of my collar, I sure wish they’d make that jingling go away because Lady and Mister ALWAYS seem to know where I am, and what I’m doing, and where was I? Oh, yes, so I got a WHOLE FRIED CHICKEN wing or some part I don’t know it was fried and meaty and the outside was really tasty and it was going to be SO GOOD I thought I should try to just nonchalantly walk into the living room with it sorta hidden in my mouth so I could lie down and really, really enjoy it? But Lady already seemed to be on to me and I heard a lot of YAP YAP YAP POLLY NO YAP YAP YAP and so I slowed down a little and got kinda low to the floor, thinking, like, maybe she won’t see me coming in to get on my pillow and savor this chicken wing I’m hiding in my mouth?

But she did. She even took it away, like right, Lady is gonna eat something I had in my mouth but I think she just threw it in the garbage to try and teach me a lesson but I know I’ll forget it the minute something good-smelling is back on the stove or counter. And she kept on with the YAPPING and the NO POLLYing and the BAD DOGging and then I had to lie down on my pillow with only the memory of the chicken wing in my mouth and that really sucked because that was gonna be one tasty chicken wing. Oh well. It’s a dog’s life here. I will keep checking for good tasting things, no matter how much they YAP and NO POLLY me, because I’M PRETTY and Lady tells me that all the time.

The apartment building jacked up my rent and so instead of luxuriating in my break-in-able first floor apartment, we moved me up to the 8th floor. (Yes, there was an elevator. It was built, I believe, in 1812 in honor of the War, and Overture, and had lost all its charm, except when it didn’t work, and then it looked peachy compared to the stairwell.)

The Next in the Bat Story Series: We had returned from a big road trip through Iowa, visiting my freshly-divorced parents, separately, of course, so that was fraught with all sorts of excitement and nerves. I will tell you what I remember the most about that trip? James gamely ate potato salad at my mother’s apartment, despite being a person who does not eat mayo-based salads, and then when the a/c went out in my car and we were forced to drive in the summer heat with the windows down, we coped by waving wildly out the window at EVERY SINGLE VEHICLE we passed on the two-lane highway. Anyone waving back made us giddy with delight. But it was hot, and it’s a long drive and so we got back to my apartment and collapsed. The next morning, I trailed behind James towards the kitchen, desperate for coffee, and not wearing glasses. He was making the coffee, and I stood in the dining room, blinking. Something in the corner caught my eye. Way up high. A dark blob on the crown molding.
“James?”
“Yeah?”
“What’s that up there? I don’t have my glasses on.”
James: shuffling, looks up at the corner in question.
“Oh. That’s a bat. Leave it alone and try not to wake it up.”

WHA HA HA HA HA WHAT? Well that was not an adequate solution or answer. I commenced with the Freaking Out Over the Bat Presence. “GET IT OUT OF HERE!” Screw coffee, a live bat in the house is enough to make me get my glasses on and move at speeds ordinarily associated with 2 in the afternoon.

James got his trout net out and stood on a stepstool. Unfortunately, the crown molding posed a problem. And at that moment, the bat woke up, and began hissing at James, showing a lower set of icky teeth.
“Just leave the room, Jennifer.”
And the bat was, unfortunately, sent to the Big Batsoteria in the Sky.

I love bats, when they’re outside and catching bugs and skeeters and flopping about, with their sonar and amazing dips and dives. I’m not afraid of them at all – but when they’re inside, I turn into a shrieking basket case, and that, dear internet, is what happened on an even grander scale with the NEXT Bat Story.

And yes, I did eventually figure out where the hell they were getting in.