I Should Not Be This Tired

 

They're vampire bats. And any night now I'm going to rise from the dead and . . . I dunno, lately I'm thinking that the superhuman strength and tirelessness would be worth never going out in daylight again. Maybe. I get to keep the champagne and the chocolate, don't I? Even vampires have peccadilloes. And Con drank some orange juice (probably).

I'm sinking the medicinal champagne right now, and the chocolate is soon. In the middle of my singing lesson today Nadia's mum came in and laid a bar of chocolate on the edge of the piano. From your brother, she said.* I love my brother, said Nadia. And no, this hadn't even registered with me as slightly bizarre behaviour for the middle of a voice lesson—I mean, this is chocolate. The world keeps turning because of the existence of chocolate. Nadia looked at me apologetically. I ran out this weekend, and then I forgot to bring my wallet, she said. I shuddered. If that ever happens again, I said in all seriousness, email me**, and I'll bring you some Green & Black's. I'm not sure if the look she then gave me was of one woman who knows what keeps the world turning to another, or a, isn't this supposed to be a singing lesson? look. And she didn't unwrap the chocolate till I was on my way out the door. She's so professional.

Atlas has been striving with the Visible Holes in the attic all day—I didn't get back in time to ask him how it went, but I notice, somewhat uneasily, that the attic hatch is still closed. If he doesn't finish tomorrow, it'll be another week of small ricocheting raiders about the place before he can come back. The plan is that he's going to do what he can see to do in the attic, and then we . . . wait. Which is to say that I open the attic hatch again but keep the dustcloths ready. And maybe sleep with a pillow over my head anyway just so I don't get woken up by . . . anything. I'm sure I can hear the next several dozens of expectant bat mums flying up my eaves. If—supposing he finishes tomorrow—this week is just as rowdy as last*** then he will start going over the rest of the house for horrors like the open trench in the kitchen ceiling. He says bracingly that there won't be a problem with blocking the inner labyrinth because, of course, any wandering bats can always turn around and go back the way they came. Yes. Like the brontosaurean raccoon who died under the doorsill between my kitchen and sitting room at the beginning of one long Maine winter could turn around and go back the way it came.† And may I say that while Atlas is a wonderful human being†† and thorough he is not cheap and I don't know what the Bat Proof Super Sealant costs either. It's all very well that we're not allowed to disturb our bats†††, but where are the government grants to cover the costs of remedial construction to enable us to live in peace and amity with each other?‡

Meanwhile I'm so tired I didn't go bell ringing at Glaciation tonight: Niall is ringing some superfluous handbells, the traitor, and I don't think I'm safe to drive. Which means I would have rung like . . . like a pipistrelle trying to find her way out of the bed canopy‡‡, so it's probably all for the best.‡‡‡ I'm almost too tired to knit. Not quite. And I did cheer myself up briefly, after I told Anthea I wasn't coming to bell practise, by buying two pairs of vintage pink plastic knitting needles on Etsy.

* * *

* Clearly Wild Robert is a man of many unsuspected virtues. And here I thought he just rang bells.

** You'll note I said email. Not phone.

*** No, no, no, no, NO NO NO NO NO. . . .

† It was probably a mouse. It smelled like a brontosaurus. For several months.

†† He hoovered before he left today. The upstairs hallway is now cleaner than it was before he sawed or drilled anything.

††† That they are disturbing me is entirely beside the point, of course

‡ And no, I haven't talked to any officials at the Bat League since the advice from the local Bat Squad to Block Visible Holes. I basically don't want to know—at least not yet. The idea that there would be any financial support for major corrective surgery to a small cottage in Hampshire is a bad joke in poor taste. But there are all kinds of unworkable conservation-of-this-or-that rules out there that simply exist, and you can cope or die: I've seen a few friends going under from the fiscal strain of owning a 'listed' building—there are practical drawbacks to living in a country quite as history-ridden as this one, however passionately you support the charities devoted to preserving as much of it as possible. And I know a few churches have had their budgets strained to breaking because they've got bats in their roofs. I don't know the ends of any of these stories, and right at the moment I don't want to.

‡‡ Or possibly like a dead raccoon

‡‡‡ Being this tired is never for the best.