Well, I would post a picture but somehow I deleted it .. and that is a real bummer because this story won't be nearly as funny without the picture of the little buddy. I'll frame the story for you: Sunday night, 8:50pm. Erica and I are sitting downstairs watching a show; can't remember which one. Scott is upstairs reading to the boys before bed.
I happen to glance over to the family room when I see something move and my thought was, "Oh great. There is a bird in the house." The bird proceeds to fly over to the door where I am sitting. My thought is, "Oh )*&%. I don't think that was a bird. I think that is a bat and I'm not about to tell Erica." The bird flies back over to the corner and flies my way again. My thought was, "Yep, it's a bat." Erica sees it this time and yells, "Mom, there is a bird in the house!" She jumps up and jumps into my chair on top of me. At this point, WE BOTH proceed to SCREAM AND YELL emphatically, I might add, for Scott! We are screaming bloody murder and I still have not told Erica it is a bat. We are literally screaming and yelling and I hear nothing. I do not hear Scott running to our rescue, no stomping down the stairs, NOTHING: complete and total dead silence. We are STILL SCREAMING AND YELLING and almost crying at this point. And then, here he comes! Our HERO --- only the hero has this really ticked off look on his face and he starts yelling at us. I mean, he is really angry and he is yelling, "Don't you ever, ever, EVER do that to me again!! (Because in his mind, he thought we were playing a joke on him. BECAUSE he was tiptoeing downstairs looking for the masked murderer holding us at gunpoint. When he realizes there is no one in the room, he assumes it is a harmless prank.) And as he is about to finish giving us a "what for" and good verbal lashing, the BAT circles behind him and we are now crying and screaming and the BAT flies right in front of his face to which he then yells, "^%@&^! It's a bat!" This then completely freaks out the daughter who still thinks it is a bird and both boys who have followed Scott downstairs! I now have three children piled on top of me in the chair and I'm still trying to scream with
dead weight screaming on top of me. Our HERO reaches in the closet and grabs his trusty ... broom ... and swats the bat down onto ... the kitchen table .... and proceeds to hold him down while the bat is ..... squeaking and biting the straw. Now what. So after a quick evaluation of THE BAT, we proceed to trap him under a glass bowl for further evaluation by Jack and Erica, who are now crying because we are talking about death for the bat. "You are going to kill him?" "You can't kill him!" "No, Daddy, don't kill him." ARE YOU SERIOUS? Besides, the bat was injured at this point. So the kind, loving and calm children head upstairs. Jack turns before going and asks quietly, "Can this be our science for school tomorrow?" Uh .. yeah. So we slide the bat under the bowl onto a flat cookie sheet and Scott takes him outside and takes his life with his trusty ..... shovel ... so the bat wouldn't be hurting any longer and put him out of his misery. And I sanitize, bleach and wipe bat fuzz off our kitchen table. "My HERO." As Beth Carter says, "only at the Pearce household." This is a true statement.
