I go flying down the hall.
Dr. Grumpy: "Craig! Are you okay?!!! What's wrong?!!!"
Craig: "THERE'S A LIZARD ON MY WALL!!!"
Dr. Grumpy: "That? For crap's sake, Craig, it's 2 inches long. They eat bugs. It's not going to hurt you."
Craig: "IT COULD CLIMB UP TO THE CEILING AND GET OVER MY BED AND DROP ON TOP OF ME AND CRAWL IN MY MOUTH AND I COULD CHOKE AND IT WOULD KILL ME IN MY SLEEP!!!"
So, in order to protect my children from a dangerous, potentially-lethal, 2-inch-long bug-eating lizard, I got a yardstick and tupperware container, and gently captured the menacing beast.
It's now out in the yard, where the bug hunting is likely better, anyway.
36 comments:
The joys of parenting. Go Dad!
Poor Craig. Not only would it be mega embarrassing to have died from choking on a lizard. But he would have died choking on a lizard with bed hair!!!!
I've had a similar experience with screaming little girls who wont sleep because a gecko/huntsman is inside.
Reminds me of my childhood. There was a cockroach on my ceiling right over my bed one night. My mom sent my dad in, who half-assed slapped at it with his fishing shoe. He missed; it fell down behind the headboard of my bed. "Sorry" he says, and went back to bed. I spent the rest of the night w i d e awake in fear that the icky thing would crawl on me and get in my ear.
you big game hunter you
Or worse--it could have messed up his hair!
Marie could kick her brother's butt! Is Marie as scaredy cat as Craig, Mr. Grumpy?
Crownedwithvictory, my mom did the same thing to me with a spider. There was a huge spider on my wall, and I called her to come kill it. She tried to squash it with a bunch of paper towels, and missed and it fell down behind the bed. She insisted she got it, until I made her show me the paper towels. I slept on the couch that night (and I was about 14 at the time).
So Craig , can we interest you in college in Alaska, they have no lizards
lol I sympathize with Craig. Those geckos freak me out when they get in the house. Thankfully my kids haven't found one in the house - their shrieking would shatter glass. We didn't have geckos where DH and I grew up, so it was definitely a surprise when we first saw them on the windows at night!
Ordinary children wouldn't worry about minor things like airway protection!
I think I would have told him to sleep lying on his side to minimize the risk of aspiration...
Other Lizards - "What are you doing out of the house??"
Gecko - "There was a Craig on my floor!"
OL - "Oh, come on! It wouldn't have hurt you. It can't even reach you on the ceiling."
Gecko - "It might have! It had HAIRSPRAY! It could climb up to the ceiling and try to style me!!"
I read somewhere -- and it might even be true! -- that in our lifetime we'll swallow an average of 3 spiders while we sleep.
YUM!
And not a hair on his pretty little head was touched due to the heroic measures of his doting daddy, who, spends his entire paycheck outfitting Craig w/the proper (and top of the line) hair products. What time did this happen and did Nurse Grumpy hear the scream?
1. Roughly midnight.
2. The whole neighborhood did.
Shades of "Annie Hall".
I did have to get my mother to remove a house fly from the bath while I was in it when I was about 16. She came in muttering about what a wussy I was until she saw the size of the thing preforming the backstroke. In my defense, if I hadn't been naked in the water with it, I would have dealt with it myself. It was spectacularly large for a house fly, close to full centimeter long.
We currently have problems with barn flies, which sometimes come in on the guinea pigs' hay. I'd love to have some geckos in the house; the whole family prefers lizards to bugs.
Did you remind him that the lizard was going to eat the spider that really was going to come down and crawl in his mouth.
And he should know about swallowing spiders from the old song
There was an old lady who swallowed a spider,
That wiggled and wiggled and tickled inside her.
She swallowed the spider to catch the fly.
But I dunno why she swallowed that fly -
Perhaps she'll die.
Did it flex it's muscles ? ;-)
more importantly, did Craig's hair survive the ordeal?
how come the hysterical screaming of the psychopath-with-a-butcher-knife-has-broken-into-the-house-and-is-about-to-kill-me didn't scare the lizard away?
Was it a Gecko or an Anole?
Assure The Hair that neither would harm his mop.
The "the psychopath-with-a-butcher-knife-has-broken-into-the-house-and-is-about-to-kill-me" scream didn't faze the lizard because it heard it before -- from Nurse or Doctor Grumpy. Or from a Mongolian Yak herder.
The more important question is why ithe lizard is in the house. Either it was terminally confused (a case for a reptile neurologist) or it was after bugs (a case for the Orkin Man or one of his tribe.)
Maybe it was after matzo? (Just kidding!)
I grew up in south east asia. We were much more concerned about the overly agressive mosquitos and other biting bugs. The 2-4 inch Cicaks and up to 20 inch lime green Geckos were very welcome in the house and bedroom.
Dad finally discovered just how big the Geckos were when he went to the bathroom one night and there was a 12 inch Gecko on the mirror. Lime green with orange spots. Makes you wonder if you've been drinking. He did his business then said "As you were" whle walking out of the room. Mom asked who he was talking to and he told her an imaginary lizard and gave a description. Mom told him it wasn't imaginary the next morning.
In case you are curious, here you can find him here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tokay_gecko
Holy crap! My kids would have caught it and begged me to let them keep it for a pet.
Tokay gecko: be-yoo-ti-ful
I'd have tried to catch the lizard - I'd have screamed like that if it had been a 2-inch spider - weeeeell, no, I'd have woken the neighbourhood with wild bumping noises from the broom I'd hunt the spider with.
Big lizard in my backyard
Can't afford to feed him anymore
Big lizard in my backyard
Bustin' down my neighbor's door
(Sorry, should have thought of it earlier. Gotta stop reading your prose before the coffee intake.)
I have brown anoles in my house(Florida)-no bug problem at all.
lived in bangkok in the late 60's as a kid. absolutely loved the gekkos. all of them. lots of them.
At least it didnt try to sell him insurance
Am so very glad that you carried the lizard outside to his family. During Peace Corps training in the former Zaire (now back to being called the Congo) we had small lizards just everywhere. They didn't freak me out, but the gargantuan spiders DID.
Fortunately, those disgusting and frightening eight legged things never came inside or I would have had a heart attack and screamed way louder than Craig most likely. I would have whomped a spider but good, but the lizards are cute. Could have been the Geico Gecko, did he have a British accent?
You have a good heart to have placed said lizard outside. You definitely have to live in the west. We have no lizards in Ohio. They must not like the cold winters here.
In other circumstances, perhaps the critter would've been invited to join the party?
Laughing but it reminds me of once upon a time my sister let out one of those types of screams. My parents had just watched the news about a rapist/kidnapper on the loose near our part of town. My father hurdled the bed took out a chunk of the wall on the way to get her. came in to her room calmed her down to find out in her haze of waking up she saw a spider. turned out to be a lint ball. but come to think of it Pot here. they had to deal with my night terrors/ disoriented panic attack nightmare whatever you call them.
This is why you need a cat, Doctor Grumpy!
Yeah, cat. Good Critters, are cats. But when I was in an outdoor roach-infested cottage in Mississippi,(That means the big suckers with parbs on their legs) the cats were scared of THEM!
Ms. Donna,
Oh, you mean palmetto bugs. We got 'em here in Florida but the anoles eat 'em right up.
but then again, the lizard was found in a *boy's room*. the bug hunting might be better in there than outside, after all!!
I saw this on line today-
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2175220/Schoolboy-10-finds-reptile-Tesco-loaf-bread.html?ito=feeds-newsxml
uncanny....suppose THAT happened?
I can't say I blame him. That COULD happen.
Haha, you're an awesome dad.
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