Dead bat fun

You know what summed up my Saturday? "Hey, Dad - dead bat."

Now most people would say, "Yeah, I'm gonna chalk up any day that includes the phrase 'dead bat' as a bad one." But not me. No, sir. My reaction was, "Awesome! And we almost all walked past it!"

You see, my kids and I went out with my dad to some land he has, and we put the icing on the cake with finding a dead bat at the end of the trip. Score!

I know what you're saying, "Uh, a dead bat made your day?" To which I say, "Yes, good sir, yes it did!!!"

We headed out in the woods the way most folks do - with a pink fishing rod, a magnifying glass and a machete. My daughter had the fishing rod, which we quickly realized would be rather ineffective with a broken bobber, so we stashed it. The magnifying glass was brought so that we could lose it later. The machete was on hand because, well, it's awesome to use a machete.

While most people like walking the woods on a nice, orderly path, I find that the woods are far more exciting off the path. And under a log. And occasionally ankle deep in mud.

Our first stop was up on a ridge where some beavers had been doing a little tree trimming. It was up on the ridge when my daughter made the first squeal of pain of the day. We turned around (machete ready, just in case). A branch had caught her shirt. "And how are we going to know if you are actually hurt?" my dad asked. She thought for a moment. Apparently this kind of sunk in because when she got whacked in the face with a branch a while later, she let out a tiny muffled groan but kept on trekking.

Part of our process was to find where the property line is so, as we were hiking over hill and over dale, we were constantly on the lookout for bright yellow flagging. I am sure it is how Lewis and Clark did it. The kids were troopers. And I was able to keep them motivated by my brilliant decision to wear shorts.

You see, we were tromping through plenty of briar-laden woods; a short while into it, my legs looked as though someone had taken a Weed Whacker to them. So when a little whining started up, I could simply say, "Look at my legs! Do you see me whining?" I'm sure they appreciated that.

By the time we reached the end of the property, the kids estimated that they had walked 113 miles over approximately 42 days.

As we made our way back to our starting point, my son did start to lag a little. And by "lag a little" I mean sit down and say he was going to take a nap. Or we could carry him. My dad and I had a good laugh over that one. I asked my son whether complaining was going to help him walk faster. He did not find that amusing.

We eventually got him motivated by finding a few boards to turn over, even catching a couple of salamanders under one. Before they knew it, we were back to the road where the car was, ready to make our woods exit.

We had parked right by a bridge, and as we were crossing the bridge, that's when my son saw the bat. And as good stewards of nature, we told my son he must become one with the bat and eat it.

Ha! Little rabies humor there. We used this as an opportunity to explain to the kids about rabies and tell them that, if they were good, we'd show them the heartwarming tale of "Old Yeller."

In all, it was a great woods walk, and I was impressed how the kids were gamers with only a hint of whining or complaining. I'm looking forward to the next time. When I'll be wearing jeans.