Monday, October 22, 2007

Bats Part 2

So many folks have been curious as to what happened with the bats. I apologize for being gone for so long. Life has a habit of getting in the way. I've been so busy with family lately, as it should be at times. But, the hubby went to TN for the weekend and I have a little quiet alone time. I will try my best to finish the story of the bats. I only hope that some of the people who read the original post are still lurking around and checking back here to get the ending.


So, there we were. Two enormous bats hanging on the house. No one would help us out. No one knew where the heck these things had come from. I was really annoyed with the animal control guy. I mean, that was his job, to rescue poor ordinary people like me from scary, perhaps life threatening, wild animals! Without his help I wasn't sure what to do. I hid in my house and thought about what my options might be. Suddenly I had an idea!

There is an awesome zoo in Colombus. Surely they would be interested in three foot bats. I looked up the number and quickly called. It took being transferred several times and telling my story over and over before I was connected to the right person.

Can you believe my luck!! My case was so unusual that after emailing photos to the zoo, and having the animal control people call and verify that I was really telling the truth and not some freaky crazy woman....I got to talk to the man himself.


Yep, that's right, Jack Hanna himself talked to me on the phone. He just happened to be at the zoo the day I called. A few hours later-- there was Jack at my home. He was shocked and amazed at the two bats. There are not supposed to be bats that large in North America. These two were very strange and shouldn't even exist. Duh.... Jack and his helpers from the zoo easily captured the scary beasts and said they would definitely keep us informed on what they found out about their existence.

The first thoughts were that they had escaped from a zoo or someone had brought them up from South America illegally. Then after studying them for a few days the zoo discovered they were a type of bat normally found in our area....just giant specimens.

A team of researchers/specialists was eventually called in to investigate. They began to investigate every type of place they knew this type of bat roosted. It was not unusual for these bats *in their normal small and not scary as hell ginormous size* to roost in barns, storage type buildings, and warehouses. There are many of these types of places in our area....so the investigation was looking like a gigantic challenge.

There was finally a break... chemicals found in the bats' bloodstreams led the team of investigators to one of the huge plants on the Ohio River just a few miles south of where we live. Jackpot!

The investigation turned up several more of the large species of bat roosting in the buildings of the plant. It is a well known fact that the community we live in has been fighting with this company for many years over the amount of chemicals and pollution it spews into the air. These same pollutants caused a mutation in the bats and created the monsters that showed up on our front door step.

Of course the company didn't want any of this to get out to the public....they are striving to maintain that they do their best to follow all the EPA guidelines.....sure, whatever. The story was squashed from running in the papers...and I believe a huge research grant was made to the zoo to keep things quiet . So, we don't know what happened to the other large bats. I'm assuming that there are still mutant bats out there and I keep my eye out for them in the twilight hours....

The two that were at our home are now on display at the Colombus zoo. If you are ever there you should go and check them out. I believe they are part of the Africa exhibit... they don't want people here in the US freaking out over huge ass bats...but I know the truth and now so do you!

Saturday, October 13, 2007

Manic Monday: Bat

I have a couple of cool pictures for today's word: Bat


This one was hanging right outside my front door...you can see the doorknob just to the left of his wing.....biggest dang thing I've ever seen. I woke up in the morning, got my cup of coffee and started to step outside the door to see what kind of day it was and lo' and behold there he was. He was hanging by one foot on the left-over halloween decorations.... we thought someone had put another decoration up as a joke. But no...it was a real bat! He was about 3 feet long at least.





Here is his buddy. This one was hanging from one of the eaves on the second floor. Pretty creepy huh? We called animal control and the guy who came out said he wasn't touching these guys with a 10 foot pole.

We couldn't have anyone over with a huge 3 foot bat on our front porch, right in front of the door, so we had to come up with some kind of plan......

Friday, October 12, 2007

Running With the Devil


Oh yeah, I went and saw Van Halen in Cleveland, Wednesday night!! It was AWESOME!! Another band that I never thought I would get to see together again in my lifetime. Eddie Van Halen is AMAZING on guitar. Probably the best guitarist I've ever seen/heard in person. He rocked on "Eruption"...just unbelievable.

And yes DAVID LEE ROTH is back! *Van Halen with Sammy Hagar and that other guy from Extreme doesn't really exist for me* I love Diamond Dave! He is such the performer. Can't do all the crazy jumping around like he did back in the 80's but he still has that high kick!

He sounds just like he always did. I had flashbacks to being 14 again and sitting in my best friend's room, hanging out with all the "heads". All the guys liked her and I was always the odd girl out....until we got older.

They didn't have Michael Anthony with them...but Wolfgang *Eddie's son* did a fairly decent job. I only saw him get flustered on one song...and I think they got off track as a whole band.

And so, I leave you with some classic Van Halen: JUMP! *The year I made cheerleader we tried out to this song* They ended the concert with this song...oh Dave, you were so hot then....you are so strange now.... I know he misses that hair.




Monday, October 01, 2007

Manic Monday: Orange


The word for today is: ORANGE
I am currently working on teaching my 2 and 3 year olds their colors. Now the 3 year old pretty much has the basics down. She knows the colors and can point to them and tell you what they are....she has no clue about letters and numbers, but by golly she knows the colors.
The 2 year old knows the color pink. That's about it. BUT...she can tell you what every letter of the alphabet is, by sight. AND she knows all her numbers by sight. It's scary...
What I am working on with both of them is a series of songs about the major colors. We have a song for Red, Yellow, Blue, Green, Purple, Orange, Brown, Pink, Black, and White. I am going to share the Orange song with you today. You are so lucky!
ORANGE
(sung to the tune: 10 Little Indians)
O - R - A - N - G - E
O - R - A - N - G - E
O - R - A - N - G - E
Orange is what that spells.
Jack-o-lanterns are always orange,
Carrots are always orange,
Oranges are always orange,
O - R - A - N - G - E!
Now if any of you other moms out there want to know the words and the tunes for the other songs just send me a line and I'll share. They are all pretty cute and most of them are easy for the kids to learn. My girls already know the songs for red, yellow, blue, and green. We are working on the others....we practice our color songs in the tub.