About an hour ago, I decide to get up and water the plants. It would give me an excuse to get up and, with it being hotter than hell around here lately, it would be nice to be back in the part of the office that's NOT 90 degrees.
So I fill the big green plastic watering can with water and make small talk with the balding "straighten the rug!" lawyer (and, yes, I can see the irony there). I make my way down the hallway, waddling more than usual as I tug on the water-filled container.
Reaching the conference room, I push open the door and gasp as the heat and humidity hit me straight in my pinkened, freckled face. There are ten plants in here that I have to water, feed, and, most importantly, NOT KILL.
The first two go over just fine, I manage not to water my shoes - which happens often - and is probably the real reason for the squeak they make with every step.
I approach the third one and start the watering process. It's a large Palm and has big fronds and two stems that need to be watered thoroughly. I water the first half and hear my shoes squeak.
Or so I thought.
I look closely at a brown leaf in the bottom of the pot. It's nestled up against the biggest stem and then moves closer to the middle of the plant.
Wait. MOVED?
"SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIT!"
I scream and sit down my watering can. Running into the lobby I kick up my feet and do what will be forever known as a "crazy person jig." (I think Ashley Simpson did one similar to it on SNL a while back...)
A few heads poke out of office doors.
"THERE'S A BAT! A BAT! IN THE CONFERENCE ROOM! A BAT! OH CRAP! I WATERED IT!"
I jog back to the Office Manager and tell her what has happened.
"Well, how do you know it's a bat?" she asks me.
"I watered it... and it squeaked at me!" I say in between fits of tear-streaming laughter.
We open the window in the conference room and sit a tomato on the sill to entice him to vacate his new home. He sits and licks the bugs off the side of the plant stem. His little pink tongue is alarmingly cute.
A little bit ago the building maintenance worker came, lifted up the entire plant, bat and all , and took him to the roof for relocation.
Squeakity, squeak, squeak. I miss him already.
3 comments:
Awwww. This is the time of year when brown bats have their babies out and about. They used to hang onto the concrete walls on the shady sides of the prison buildings where I used to work. So cute! (You know how much I love bats!)
Oh how cute!
be well,
Dawn
At least it did not come after you. I remember watering outside at my folks & it came out from under the eve & flew so close to my head. I asked my dad if that was a bird & he said, "Pretty big wing span for a bird" I said then what? Why did I ask? BAT???! ICK! Whole nest of them hanging on the big beams for a few years! My neighbor's son loved it though.
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