Fevers, Flame Throwers, and Bat Attacks

After lying around sick and dying for days, I should have gone to bed early last night and gotten some much needed sleep. But that wasn't to be. Savannah had begged me to let her go to the midnight showing of Twilight when it first came out. I was a mean mom and didn't let her go. Then she begged me to let her go to the midnight showing of New Moon when it first came out, but again, I was mean and wouldn't let her go. Last night, Savannah begged me to let her see the midnight showing of Eclipse, and knowing how important it is to be firm and consistent in all parenting matters, I said, "Sure, whatever, knock yourself out. Just please tell me you have a ride home because I may be dead from this sore throat by 2:00 AM." She gave me that look. Not the look that says, "But Moooom, I have to go! All my friends are going! I'll just die if I don't get to go!" Nope, I'm immune to that look. When I receive that look from one of my kids, I just respond with, "Hey, we didn't have CELL PHONES when I was your age! Do you really wanna tell me how your life will end if you don't get this?" That usually shuts them up.

But no, she didn't give me that look. She gave me the sad, resigned, "I know you work hard and you're tired and you really try to do everything for us, Mom" look. Ugh. I'm not immune to that look. I hate that look! I hate feeling like I've let someone down. If she'd just fought me and talked back, I would've been okay, but noooo, she had to accept that I was too tired and too sick to pick her up so late. And I couldn't accept that.

Sooo, being the total pushover dedicated parent I am, I stayed awake until it was time to pick her up at 2:15 AM. You know who stays up until 2:00AM when they're running a fever and feeling like the stuff floating in my fire pit of soot-water (aka Ye Ole Fishing Hole)? Crazy people, that's who! Well, and vampires and werewolves, of course. And the undead. And every mother of a newborn. And that "Time to Make the Donuts" guy. But mostly crazy people. Like me.

When 2:15 rolled around, I hadn't died of a sore throat or achy back yet, so I got Savannah and her friend and dropped everyone off at the correct house and didn't fall asleep at the wheel. I returned home, locked up, and shuffled back into my bedroom where I felt something brush my arm. Since I shed approximately 350,000 hairs a day (I have no idea how I'm not bald) and since I learned my lesson after my spider freak-out, I naturally thought a hair was tickling my arm. I brushed at it and it flew. IT FLEW! Hair doesn't fly! What the??? It was a bat! Holy cow, there was a stinking BAT in my bedroom!

Okay, it might have possibly just been a moth. But it looked like a bat. I'm pretty sure it had fangs and it was the size of a Buick. So, I did what any sane, rational, quick-thinking person would do. I grabbed my bottle of Philosophy Inner Grace perfume and I sprayed it to death! Except it didn't work. I didn't, in fact, spray it to death. I only got it drunk on the fumes. And then it started flitting around in a crazed pattern, circling me. I saw him give me the evil eye right before he dive-bombed my head. I did the classic, evasive, Duck-and-Cover maneuver as I ran screaming from the room like a little girl. It's okay. I can do that. I am a girl.

Clearly, this is an alien bat programmed to destroy me. This calls for Plan B. I grabbed a paper towel and a shoe. The plan was to throw the shoe at him, knock him unconscious, then pick him up with several layers of paper towel so I couldn't feel him through the paper, then stomp him to death with the shoe. It's fool-proof! It's brilliant! It's...okay, it's late and I'm sick and this is an alien bat, so even while I was certain Plan B would work, in the back of my mind I was toying with Plan C wherein I'd wake up Clayton, give him some hairspray and a lighter and let him go to town with a homemade blowtorch. Did I mention I was feverish?

Anyway, I returned to my room only to find the moth killer zombie bat gone. Missing. Totally vanished. I was seriously freaking out at this point. I stood there with eighteen feet of paper towels dangling from my hand. I spun around, eyes darting here and there, scoping every corner of my bedroom. He's got to be in here somewhere! All ninja-like, I quietly tiptoed a couple steps to the side, then whirled around to face death head-on! He wasn't there. I sneaked over to my curtains and quick-as-a-whip, ripped them back from the window! Nothing. "Ohhhh, he's good," I thought to myself. This went on for a good half hour while I made little surprise attacks on unsuspecting pieces of furniture, bedding, and stacks of laundry around my room. Nothing.

I decided that perhaps my fever was getting the best of me, so I decided to take a shower to cool off while I turned off all the lights in my room, and turned on all the lights in the kitchen. That'll draw him out, I convinced myself as I showered.

When I got out of the bathroom, I made my way to the kitchen, positive I'd see the moth flitting around the light. Nope. Which just solidified my belief that it was indeed a bat. He was perfectly content staying in my darkened room. By this time it was 4:00 AM and extreme tiredness had overcome me, so I finally gave up. I quickly dove under the covers and pulled them up over my head. In my sleep deprived state, I was somehow okay about dying from lack of oxygen under the covers all night, but I really didn't want guano in my hair. It made sense to me at the time.

Thankfully, I woke up this morning and the bat had not eaten my face off, so I think my burrowing under the covers worked. Either that or he's just making me wait. He's making me sweat it out. And just when I forget about him, that's when he'll attack!

Oh and look at the time! It's after 2:00 again. Sigh. I'd better get to bed before I start thinking my pillow is an alligator.