Today seems a bit more normal, so I don't think I'll be jinxing anything by posting about the day I had yesterday.

It all started when I woke up at 5 AM because the cats were going absolutely nuts. Once I awakened enough to figure out what was making all the noise, I realized there was a bat flying in circles around my bedroom. At that point, I was still too sleepy to do much beyond think "I don't want the cats to catch it," so I herded the cats and myself into the living room, shut the bat into my bedroom, and slept the rest of the night on the couch. I went back into the bedroom in the morning to see if the bat was still there, and I couldn't find any trace of it, so I figured it must have gone back into the attic (which is accessed through a trapdoor in the ceiling of my bedroom) and went off to work.

Once at work, it occurred to me that I might want to look up some more information about bats, and in Googling, I found this interesting page, which I quote in part: "People usually know when they have been bitten by a bat. However, because bats have small teeth which may leave marks that are not easily seen, there are situations in which you should seek medical advice even in the absence of an obvious bite wound. For example, if you awaken and find a bat in your room, see a bat in the room of an unattended child, or see a bat near a mentally impaired or intoxicated person, seek medical advice and have the bat tested." [emphasis added by me]

Obviously, this concerned me, so I called the Cornell health center to get their opinion on whether or not that was overkill, and they advised me to go get rabies shots. Now, I was 99% sure I wasn't bitten. But, if I was wrong and I was bitten and the bat was rabid, I'd, you know, DIE. So, off I went to the hospital, where I sat around for five hours waiting for them to a) actually find some rabies vaccine and b) agree to give it to me, since apparently the CDC recommendations mean nothing to them. That's also when I found out that the hospital I went to was actually not the one hospital in town that has the contract with the county health department to supply the vaccine, which would have been nice to know at some point during the check-in process, rather than after I'd been sitting there for three hours. Fortunately, the ER has free wireless, so I was able to entertain myself by chatting on AIM. It was in this fashion that my roommate informed me that her mom, a doctor, had looked at the CDC regulations, talked to an infectious disease specialist, and recommended that roomie get rabies shots too (since bats can get through a quarter-inch gap, and none of the doors in our apartment actually close more tightly than that), and that we vacate the apartment until the bat issue had been dealt with.

So, after I finally got my first shots (we both have to get more on Thursday, next Monday, the Monday after that, and two Mondays after that), I went home to pick roomie up so we could go to the other hospital for her shots. This is also when we talked to our landlords about their little bat problem and how they might want to look into that, and oh yes, we also needed a copy of their homeowners insurance policy for billing purposes (I'm still not clear on precisely who pays for the vaccines, the county health department or the homeowners, but either way it's not us). Needless to say, they were not happy with us, and there were noises made about "Well, since you don't have a lease, you're just going to take all your stuff and go tonight, right?" Um, no, and you do NOT pull that "no lease" shit with two law students. There was an offer, there was acceptance, there was consideration, and it's all documented in e-mails, bitch. Fortunately, after the county health department contacted them, they started to take things more seriously and everything was OK after that.

Anyway, we hauled ourselves and the cats over to the Holiday Inn for the night, and today I'm meeting the owners and the inspectors over at the house at 2 so we can see what's going to happen from this point on. I think it's likely we'll be able to go back to the apartment tonight, which would be nice - the cats are not too happy at the hotel, and I feel bad for having to disrupt them again, but I wasn't about to leave them in the damn Batcave despite their up-to-date rabies vaccinations.

The reason I say that yesterday was surreal, instead of really incredibly bad? While I was sitting in the ER, I noticed that there was a new e-mail in my business inbox. I checked it out, and I've been invited to do the cover photography for a hardback book being published to support Animal Lifeline of Iowa, Inc. (a no-kill special needs shelter) and celebrate their 20th anniversary. The reason I'm being asked to get involved is that the dog they want for the cover shot, a paraplegic black lab named Abacus, moved to Ithaca with his owners four years ago. So, I was sitting there in the ER, possibly rabid, finalizing a book cover deal.

My life is just so weird sometimes.