Fear and Loathing at the Vet's Office

The bat flew away.  Into the night. Released to the wild.

That's my story and I am sticking to it.

I had not thought to keep it. I never thought we'd want to put it on ice in a freezer bag so it could be surgically decapitated and tested for rabies.  Sorry. Call me crazy. I had bigger worries that night. Like who would find my lifeless body if the damn bat managed to get tangled up in my hair and I dropped dead like I know I would have. Keeping the nasty little thing as a souvenir was not high on my hit parade. I am an urban girl.  I never had a bat emergency plan.  And since I don't have the bat and that isn't going to change by shaming me, I don't see the harm in telling the evil Dr. Tyson that it is off living the life of Riley flying around bucolic Pennsylvania.

"Oh. Well that leaves us in a bit of a predicament." 

Does it now?  Are we ever going to get to the part where we give the cat a booster shot, empty my wallet and let me out of the interrogation room for the night?

"Well without the bat we aren't sure what we're dealing with."

Yes, because you morons in the veterinary community have spent all you time concocting better dog food instead of figuring out how to reliably detect rabies on a living animal.  Seriously.  Where are your PETA friends when you need them?

"And...." I say hoping for a conclusion to this uniquely humiliating little exercise.

"Well the bat could have been carrying anything. And if your cat was attacked by a sick bat, we could have any number of problems."

I am practically in tears. I am a bad mother.

"What if it had White Nose Disease."

Clutch the pearls! What if!!!!  What the hell is White Nose Disease? 

I ask him to explain.

He acts like I have been living under a rock. Haven't I read the headlines? (Hello, it's an election year. I am a little more drawn to articles pertaining to who might be the Man In Charge next year than some obscure bat ailments.)

He's rolling his eyes and gesturing like I missed the news about the AIDS epidemic.  "It's killing thousands of bats all over. No one knows why.  It's terrible."

Well it didn't kill this bat, and for that I am profoundly sorry. But I am also curious. "How would I know if the bat had White Nose?" 

"Well we'll never know, I am sorry to say."

Yes, you've made your point. I am an idiot. Noted.  "Would it have looked or acted different?"  Let's keep this conversation aimed at solutions and practicality, doc.  Enough slapping me around.  "It was flying around for quite a while."

"Oh it was flying? It wouldn't have been flying.  I didn't know that it was flying."

Yes you did. I mentioned that Trinket snagged it from the air. That would suggest flying was taking place, and if you weren't so consumed with punishing me you'd have picked up on that, asswipe.

"Yes, so I guess that makes White Nose less likely a concern. So tell me...what are we doing for Trinket now that we've established that we only know that she had a run in with a bat of unknown medical history?"