How do you make two grown men scream like girls?

Why, introduce a flying rodent into their domicile, of course.

So, I'm sitting at my computer, checking my e-mail or browsing through the IMDb or looking at pictures of hot chicks or whatever the hell I do when I'm on the computer when I notice some movement out of the corner of my eye. The movement originated from the darkened living room, which is more or less a common area with the "dining room" (which is in quotes because we never actually eat there), and at first, my thought was, "Man, that was a huge moth." I stand up to get a better look, when I realize that it wasn't a moth at all. John, who was sitting in the same room and playing Kingdom Hearts, jerked his head around as I said, "Holy shit!" and sees what I see, a winged creature of some sort fluttering around the living room. We take off like a collective shot into the kitchen, away from whatever it is. "That's a bat!" I cry.

John, however, is in total denial. "That's not a bat; that's a bird." Whatever it is, John recommends grabbing a broom and trying to shoo it out the door to the balcony, as it's the only door in our apartment that leads directly to the outside (and not to a stairway). So he grabs a broom and we proceed to creep back into the dining room so as to get a better look into the living room. It's not visible at first. Then I look at the couch and see it crawling around on the floor.

"Couch! Couch! Couch! Couch! Couch! Couch! Couch! Couch! Couch!" I exclaim, pointing. As we stand there, unsure what to do, it takes wing yet again and comes towards us. John bravely swings at it with the broom, causing it to turn and head back out into the living room. At that point we lose it, until I think I see a shape on the door. I turn on the light and, sure enough, there's our little friend clinging to the top latch. It has become a standoff as John and I stare at the tiny invader.

I get the idea to go out through the back door and around to the front to open the door and shut it quickly in order to cause it to take flight. John agrees that this is a decent idea, so I go out the back and down the stairs. On the way out, I bump into Mike, who is sitting on the back steps, chilling out. I quickly inform him of our situation just before I go around and up the stairs.

As I get to the door, I yell to John, "Are you ready?"

"As ready as I'll ever be," he replies. So I open the door and immediately slam it shut. I hear John react, and I ask him what's going on. Soon, I hear him say, "He's down!" I walk in and come to find it laying on the dining room floor. John tells me that he bopped it one with the broom. He didn't think it was hard enough to hurt it, but he apparently doesn't know his own strength. At this point, however, we still don't know what to do. Neither of us has any desire to kill the poor thing. After all, this particular bat is kind of cute.

I run to the bathroom and grab the small wastepaper basket we use to store magazines for toilet reading (or littérature de toilette as the French call it) and go back out to the dining room, where it still lies on the floor. I put the overturned basket over the creature and ask John to grab a record album to slide underneath. As I do this, Mike comes in to watch me attempt this daring feat. During my first try, I hear the poor thing freak out as the dust jacket comes into contact with him. (I don't know. Maybe he just doesn't like The Moody Blues. I haven't listened to Long Distance Voyager, the album in queston, all the way through but it's got to be better than The Other Side of Life.) On my second try, I raise the trash can up a little bit and, in doing so, start to push the bat out from underneath the trash can. I freak out and run away like the coward I am.

Mike, like a man, decides to take the initiative and scoops it into the wastepaper basket and then proceeds to walk out onto the balcony and dump it onto the railing. John and I marvel over how Mike does this without seeming even slightly uncomfortable. Then, we watch the bat on the railing, looking as though it's not going to move for quite some time. In fact, it's still there as I type this. It's moved a little since then, but not too much.

The worst part about the whole thing is the fact that we can't say for certain how it even got into our apartment. It's quite possible that it came in through the fireplace, as the flue was open a crack. But of course, my imagination tells me it somehow got in through my bedroom, and its family will soon be following.

At no point during this whole ordeal did I feel inspired to put on a costume and fight crime.