At the last barn, Beeps had found several pretty feathers, and was on a feather kick at the new barn. I told her the best place to look for them was under the big oak trees. "Don't go too far!" I called, unloading my tools and getting ready to get to work.
Beeps ran off, collecting sticks and searching for feathers. "Look a squirrel!" she says. I give the answer every exhausted parent of a young child says "Uh huh, that's nice." I was busy counting glue tips and picking pretty Equisocks colors, I was sure the squirrel was long gone. I looked over my shoulder and Beeps was watching a tree, so I got back to work.
"A squirrel!" she says again.
"Uh huh."
"No, wait, it's a baby chick!"
Now that made me stop. I turned around, figuring a baby bird had fallen out of the tree. I had 2 thoughts. The one where you tell her "The mommy bird is probably looking for her baby right now, just leave it there and she'll be back for it (aka. the snakes will find it, circle of life and all that), but. . . being a bleeding heart vegan animal lover, I was already planning on a shoe box nest, wondering where I could get baby bird food and explaining to my husband that we needed to save this baby bird (said husband is STILL in shock over the time I brought home an -adorable to me and me only- baby vulture who I raised until she was able to fend for her own).
I paused, looked at the rather long dived between me and Beeps and called out (before I made the long, exhausting walk in a pair of farrier chaps and a rasp attached to my calf) to see a dead bird. "Is it alive?" I yelled.
"Ya, I poked it with a stick, and it made a 'hissss' sound like the kitty!"
Oh crap. I dropped my rasp, tossed the apron and ran. Beeps stood with a formidable stick over a ball of soft brown fur. "What the heck is that?" I said, poking the thing with my own stick. "Hisss!" it said, lifting it's furry, nasty little head and showing off a mouth full of fangs. It unfurled a small, fleshy wing, with a tiny nasty little claw, and I suddenly knew why there was so much fear and folklore around the nasty things. "It's a bat.." I said.
"Oh, I don't like bats." Beeps said.
I poked it again for good measure, and it hissed and bit the stick. "A rabid bat." I declared. Then I freak out, "Did you touch it?"
"No, I poked it with a stick."
"Did you touch it with your hand?"
"Nope, just the stick."
"Put that stick down! It has diseases!" (God I sound like my mother)
"Eww, disease stick!" Beeps wipes her hands on her pants after throwing the stick at mommy. Apparently the stick was just fine until I called it disease stick, so it must be thrown at the bearer of bad news.
We head back to the barn, this very nice barn, with at least twenty very nice horses that do NOT need to contract rabies. We wash our hands, and I spray us down with Hoof Rx (anti-fungal and anti-viral all natural hoof spray (made by The Natural Farrier- just so you know) Safe on kids and mommy's braving rabid bats. I walk in a few nervous circles, double check that Beeps did indeed only poked the evil thing with a stick, sprayed her hands again with Hoof Rx, and then we call daddy.
"I got a weird question for you." I say when he answers.
"I got a weird answer." He laughs.
"I found a rabid bat."
"Ahh," he sighs, used to my daily antics, and bizarre stories. "Put it in a plastic bag."
"But it will chew it's way out! It's EVIL!"
"Hmmm," he says.
"I'll put it in a bucket!" I say happily, and off I go, to dig through the barn trash in search of a bucket. I found a coffee cup with a lid, good enough.
Back at the bat lair, it's furry funky little body all coiled and ready to attack at a single poke, I look down at it, the species supposedly on top of the food chain, with a Starbucks cup. I stare at the thing, Beeps stares a me, a rather large ant climbs into the cup, and eats leftover coffee moca latte while I try to figure out how to get this ball of incurable disease into my trap.
"Go get my nippers!" I say to Beeps and off she runs at full, 4 year old warp speed to the car.
She returns, thankfully with a. nippers and b. my old nippers.
I look down at this poor huddled mass, and think, I've got to kill this thing. I don't eat meat. I don't eat dairy, I don't buy the Coach leather purse though I REALLY REALLY want because it's made out of dead baby cow, and here I am, about to be a murderer. "Look away, I'm going to have to cut his head off." I tell Beeps. She turns and looks even closer. (that's my girl!)
"It's going to be gross."
"Okay!" she says excitedly. My little girl who aspires to be a dancer and a princess is ready for the decapitation, off with it's head!
I poke it with the nippers. It hisses and bites the metal. I clamp down on it, it still hisses, then I think, GOD these nippers are REALLY dull. Really really dull. So dull that the only thing the nippers were actually good at were picking up the bat and putting it into the cup (I dumped the poor giant ant out- much to his dismay of being ejected from sugary coffee heaven). I dropped Mr.Nasty into the cup, now very agitated at having a pair of St.Croix nippers mushing his neck in vain, and put the lid on. The smell of coffee and bat is a peculiar mixture, but a satisfying one indeed.
The owner arrived to a jubilant 4 year old telling her mommy has a bat coffee! I hold up the cup and smile- "Just one more service I offer!"
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