Bat out of you-know-where

On Friday evening at dusk -- that gorgeous time when the sun is down, but there's still light in the sky, and the heat of the day is finally burning off -- my husband and I were coming home from our date at the Chinese restaurant.

We were sitting at a stop light downtown, with no other cars around us, which was unusual. Except for some people with little kids still lingering by the fountain in the city square (the fountain has those squirty things in the ground that toddlers like to play in), it was deserted. All the workday traffic was gone and there was an unaccustomed hush that was very pleasant.

Which is probably why the bat felt so free to make its presence known.

As we sat, a bat swooped down from somewhere near the top of the YMCA building and did an extravagant figure-8 in front of the van, close enough to be easily visible, but not so close as to send me diving into the rear of the vehicle, screaming and and sticking my head under a seat to protect my hair. It dove and rose, fluttering around in a show-offy kind of way, until the light turned green, at which point it got in the same lane we were in and sailed off grandly toward the next traffic light.

Which put my husband and me in the strange position of chasing a bat down a city street as it vigorously headed north. I wanted so much to lean my head out the window and shout, "EEEE-WOOOOOOOO EEEEE-WOOO WOW-WOW-WOW-WOW!!!!" like a police cruiser's siren, but my husband wouldn't let me.

I like to think that some other concerned citizen made an arrest later and that the bat was released on his own recognizance.