I'm back. Still

I'm back. Still alive and whatnot.

I didn't do much last night. I made Mac & Cheese. I also got the strangest telemarketing call I ever have had. It was from MCI, who wanted me to switch to them from Ameritech. I listened to their schpiel, asked some questions, and decided to go ahead and make the switch. At some point during our conversation I mentioned having 2 roommates, so in the dead time she asked "So... 2 roommates. You must be a young guy." I told her I was 21, and it turns out that she was 20. So as she entered my information into the computer and waited for results or whatever, we talked about her college, her roommates (2 guys and 3 girls), the things we did on the 4th of July, our weekend plans, etc. It was all very strange, but I imagine telemarketers get hung up on and treated like shit so often that some pleasant conversation made her day. I know what it's like to have days where no one treats you like a human being.

So, I watched the John Holmes story on E!, talked to Alan and Fabish a bit, then went back in my bedroom to check my email and fiddle around with my computer. After about 20 minutes I heard something odd in my ceiling, sort of like scratching. My bedroom has a drop ceiling, with some of the panels removed while we set up and configure our network. I first suspected that another bat had gotten into my room and flown through one of the panels into my drop ceiling. I later dismissed that idea, since that first bat attack was obviously a weird fluke that could never happen twice. I mean, flying through a semi-open window, through my blinds, into my room... it didn't seem possible to happen more than once. I figured it was the dog from the apartment above me scratching on the floor or something and went about my business. After a minute or 2, it became obvious that the noise was obviously wings flapping, as it was moving very quickly around the room (sort of). I went to the living room and grabbed Fabish and Alan to help me trap the stupid thing. We went in my room, but heard no weird sounds. They dismissed it as my paranoia at first, but I insisted. Then I went around the room and pushed up on the drop ceiling panels, until it started flying again. Once it flew over the flourescent light and you could make out the silhouette, and that convinced them. It was funny because we were all just sort of standing there, completely calm, watching the ceiling and following the noises with our eyes. Finally the bat found one of the open panels and got free. It was even funnier to watch all of us go from completely calm staring at a ceiling to completely freaked out and covering our faces. The bat took off into the main living area of the apartment, and as Fabish chased it with a bucket, Alan and I went through the apartment shutting all the doors to the rooms that the bat wasn't in. Finally the bat settled down on our wall and we put the bucket on top of it, slid a piece of cardboard underneath it, and led it outside. For some reason, Fabish wanted to keep it in the bucket until the morning to show his girlfriend. I thought that was a little weird... but whatever. So that was my adventure. Afterwards Fabish noted that the first bat may have been a mother bat that laid eggs in my ceiling, so we'd be fighting this problem all summer. I reminded him that bats don't lay eggs, although he still may have a point. How many bat babies can a bat have at one time? Can they live in a ceiling without a mother? Will they stink if I just let them die up there?