I don’t have a belfry, but apparently I should be in the market for one.
One week ago tonight — technically it was 4:30 a.m. Monday — your favorite columnist had an interesting experience.
Picture this.
You’re in the middle of a sound sleep. You wake up because you hear a weird scratching sound.
You initially equate it to rain and hail on the windows. But then you remember the weather had been beautiful that day and nothing in the forecast even hinted at window-pounding precipitation.
You get out of bed and flip on the light. You open the curtains on one of two sets of windows on the north wall of your second-story bedroom.
Nothing.
You open the other curtain and OUT FLIES A BAT!
Eeeeeeeeeek!
Yes, I screamed like a 10-year-old girl. At first I was so freaked out I didn’t realize my uninvited guest had chomped on the end of my left middle finger.
I dashed out of the room and closed the door behind me.
Downstairs, I located a tennis racquet. This was war, and I had no intention of losing.
Later I would read that the proper way to capture a bat is to place a coffee can over it and carefully slide a piece of cardboard under the can and … Yeah, right.
As I headed upstairs with my weapon, I wondered how long it would take to figure out where he was hiding. But as soon as I opened the door, I saw the ugly creature flying around in tight, counterclockwise circles.
On his first pass, I swung and missed. He had changed course faster than a Corey Kluber sinker.
On my second swing, I nailed him. Line drive into the gap, all the way to the wall.
Approaching with caution, weapon drawn, I quickly determined he wasn’t going anywhere fast. Or ever.
Gathering evidence
Next stop: garbage bag and glove.
As luck would have it, I had lost the right-hand glove in a set of winter gloves and knew where to find the left one, which apparently I had kept for just such an occasion.
I picked up the corpse, dropped it into a small garbage bag, tossed in the glove and put the bag on the screened-in porch.
Later I learned I should have refrigerated him. For an accurate rabies test, the brain must not be decomposed. But what do you want from me at 4:30 in the morning?
Fortunately, the temperature was cool and I didn’t melt him down.
Only after the bat was in the bag did I feel pain in my finger. I looked and saw an enormous blood blister that hadn’t been there when I went to bed. Uh-oh.
The next morning became Take Your Bat to Work Day. First order of business: phoning Summit County Public Health.
Yes, they said, they would test him for rabies. I had a choice of going to the agency’s big complex behind Acme 1 in West Akron (which I did) or its office on Graham Road near state Route 8 in Stow.
My new best friend, Mike Harrison, a sanitarian in the Division of Environmental Health, took my little buddy and told me I probably didn’t need to visit a doctor unless the bat was rabid — and that would be determined by 4 p.m. the next day.
Mixed messages
Back in the office, I quickly Googled “bats” and “rabies,” relying on sources such as the Centers for Disease Control and state health agencies.
Talk about a roller coaster.
• “Rabies is a fatal disease. The most common way for people to get rabies in the United States is through contact with a bat.” Uh-oh.
• “Rabid bats rarely attack humans.” Whew.
• “Any bat that is active by day or is found in a place where bats are not usually seen, like in your home or on your lawn, just might be rabid.” Uh-oh.
• “Only a few people die of rabies each year in the United States, sometimes sleeping people who didn’t know they were bitten.” Whew.
Next, of course, I Googled the treatment, having a vague recollection that it involves an endless series of extremely painful shots given in the stomach with an enormous needle.
Good news: Injections are now in the upper arm. Bad news: You still need a series of four, spread over two weeks.
Meanwhile, my ever-loving colleagues at the Beacon Journal thought the whole thing was hysterically funny.
Features Editor Lynne Sherwin did some Googling of her own and took delight in sending me scary links.
The next day, before the results were in, she asked aloud to no one in particular, “Are we going to have to take Dyer out back and shoot him like Old Yeller?”
She couldn’t just leave it there. “The difference is that everybody cried when they put down Old Yeller.”
Wham!
Agonizing wait
The next day dawned, but the news didn’t. A few minutes before 4 o’clock, I called Mike. He said the results usually are in by 4 the next day, and he’s not sure why they aren’t, but he’ll call me as soon as they are.
Mike said there was no urgency to start rabies shots because they can be given any time before the end of a relatively long incubation period. The CDC says injections should start within 10 days.
Mike cautioned that a determination might not be possible because of the bat’s violent demise. Uh-oh.
By 2:45 the day after the day I was supposed to hear, still no word. I called again. Mike said we were at the mercy of a lab in Columbus.
Finally, an hour later, The News: My bat tested negative.
Whew!
Mike’s colleague Andrew Deikun says only about 4 percent of the bats submitted for testing in Summit County turn out to be rabid.
Later, Mike explained the delay. Seems the health department sent two UPS shipments to Columbus on Monday. One was my bat and the other was mosquitoes. The addresses somehow got flipped and my bat initially went to the entomology lab.
Hey, guys, while you’re at it, can you test him for West Nile?
So today, life is good.
Life could get even better tonight, depending on the outcome of a certain basketball game on the West Coast.
Let’s see ... last week at this time, I had never been bitten by a bat. Last week at this time, the Cavs had never won a championship.
Methinks it’s time for another first.
Bob Dyer can be reached at 330-996-3580 or bdyer@thebeaconjournal.com. He also is on Facebook at www.facebook.com/bob.dyer.31