Could be there be bats in those belfries?

At the Odd Fellows, there are so many nooks and crannies through which bats could squeeze that it is not unbelievable that we have nocturnal winged visitors in the dark hours of night.  Looking for long hair to tangle in.

I have a hand tool for catching them when they circle overhead. It was made to be  a landing net for fish, and many have been the lunker and smaller species of piscatorians that I've landed in this old net.  There was one I never could catch, already written about.

(http://raccoonnews.blogspot.com/2010/02/bespangled-behemoth.html)

Catching bats in this net is easy, like swinging at a tennis ball, 

although bats will zig and zag, per their nature.

A determined fish-or-bat netter will snag the creature,

whereupon the bat is taken outside and carefully released,

unharmed.

Still Fickle Bat

A bat I thought was you

Fluttered around my head

Last night after the lights

were turned off

I opened the door

To let you find your way out

But you stayed

Would not go

Winging around my sought repose

Nibbling my ear lobes

The way you used to do

 I went out myself

And you followed me

Joining another bat

Zig-zagging in the darkness

Both of you exchanged squeaks

And left

I lay awake a long time

Wondering if you’d be back

 The only way to keep you

Is to set you free

[DD 2007]]

Or, perhaps I just spent too much time studying the bat-like 1995 Maryland crab ornament,  before retiring last night?

.........................................

The nicest, brightest upper-apartment Christmas lights

are found next door to us, at 312 South Street.  There must be two identical apartments above the stores at that one address.  They each apparently have side-by-side bay windows, and are accessed from the street through a Gothic doorway (right).  While I was taking this picture a woman came out of that medieval door and entered a car parked across the street.  Pulling next to me she rolled down her window and said, "You like my lights?"

"Yeah, I love them!  So very cheeerful for our street.  I live next door to you."

She said as she drove away, "You oughta see the INSIDE!"

Unfortunately for the quality of this digitally-shot exposure (I tried several) her interior lights were also blazing.  Those bright ceiling lights somewhat diminished the many strings of colored lights bannering her window glass.  But maybe I will try again when she has the lights off.

Meantime, I'll rack this sighting up as a simple antidote to the outlying Waukesha dwelling's massive, electric meter-spinning illuminations.   So bright and lustrous that people at Christmas-time take drives through these 'better' neighborhoods, to o-o-o-o and a-h-h-h-h as they slowly meander the streets and lanes.  Have been there, done that.

I'd invite them to see what this up-beat girl did with her 'lesser' windows.  Take a drive down South Street between Grand and Clinton.

Rejoice!