Carl S. Bat

Carlsbad Caverns hosts a bat flight breakfast each summer.  The program starts early in the morning, before sunrise, and people can come eat breakfast and watch the bats fly back into the cave.

 

When I was in high school, I wanted desperately to be the mascot.  However, I was shy and definitely not in the right social circles to do so.  But man, I really wanted to be the Bellaire Cardinal.  When I was at Utah State, I was overcome by the same strong urge to dress up as Big Blue.  Our college had a mascot, Paul Bunyan, and I was able to dress up as Paul once and I absolutely loved it.

 

When I heard Carl S. Bat would be making an appearance at the breakfast, I signed up fast as I could for that job and got it!  I had a blast.  I gave a lot of hugs, almost lost my head piece, danced, and had a grand ol' time.  Hopefully I can make another appearance as Carl before my season is up.

 

Posing with my co-worker Matt. 

Need to make sure you know who this bat works for.  I'm a Mexican Free Tail; can you see my tail?

The real thing.  Hard to see, but the things that look like specks of dust on your computer screen silhouetted against the sky are the bats flying back into the cave.

Thank you to Jen E. for the photos!