New Roommate

Yesterday I was heading out the door to practice and I opened the door that leads to the garage and bam! There he was, a little lizard having a rest on my running shoe. Now being in the desert I see all kinds of gecko's and lizards all over the place so I am pretty used to it. What I am not used to are these little guys being in my space and enjoying my things. The thing that made me feel even more creeped out was his rounded tail. I am not sure if you know this, but if a lizard gets attacked by a predator, his tail has a quick release system which might allow it to get away. The tail will eventually regenerate over time. Quite frankly it gave me the heebie-jeebies.

How did that little guy get in there? My garage door is opened for all of about 2 minutes max. per day. Regardless I wanted him out, but I didn't want to disrupt his rest too much because the last thing I wanted was to get him running and have him run in the house. If that happened, I might have to move. I grabbed a nearby golf club and tried to insert the shaft into the opening in the shoe and hoist it up and out. The problem was, the shoe was on it's side and the tongue of the shoe was inhibiting entry. Surprisingly enough, my rustling around with the shoe didn't bother him one bit. He just sat there daydreaming about all the bugs and flies he was going to eat later that day. I was really struggling with getting the shoe hoisted up, so I had to grab another golf club to chopstick it (I am sure you can figure out what that is). Meanwhile, the lizard wasn't bothered at all. He was just hanging out relaxing enjoying the ride. He might have thought it was just another minor earthquake so he didn't bother fleeing the scene. I was glad for that.

I ended up just pushing the shoe all the way out the garage to the driveway and when I got to the driveway, the shoe toppled and the little guy barely noticed. In fact, I had to give him a little poke on his rounded tail to get him going. Finally, he sprung to life and headed for cover in the bushes. I shut the door and that was that. Or so I though....

Fast forward to today.

I came home from a very enjoyable round of 9 holes and was set to watch the jackets game when I saw movement. What the heck??? I saw something scamper to just behind my golf bag. Of course I jump back and then peer around the corner and see him again. I know it is him because of his rounded tail. How did he get in? I look along the wall and what I thougt was just a flaw in the concrete surrounding the garage, ended up being a hole. He lives here. With me. In the walls of the garage. Worse yet, is there is some kind of outside access to that spot. That, or he hangs around until I come home and wait until the garage opens so he can sauter in. I highly doubt that.

Initially I didn't really worry about him being there, but as I think about it, if he can get in there, what else can? Another lizard? A family of them? A snake? That was it, I have to buy some of that spray foam that plugs holes. Hopefully I can track the little guy down so that he is out of that hole before I do it, but regardless, he needs his access blocked.

If a friggin' snake comes slithering out of there, that surely would send me into cardiac arrest. No way, this has to be done, and done quickly.

UPDATE:

Shortly afer I finished this blog entry, I went to see if I could catch the little guy out of his home. I opened the door cautiously so as to not scare him and have him jump into my house, grabbed a golf club and rattled it around a bit. Sure enough, there he was. He used my golf shoe as a bit of a hiding spot this time, but I saw him. Now to plug the hole. I decided that a plastic bag would serve a good blocker for now as I could mold it into the hole. I then taped it on. (Looking back now, I suppose I just could have put tape over the hole and left the bag off, but hey--I've never had to fend off a lizard before).

Again, I used a golf club to hoist the shoe up and out of the garage, and off into the darkness he scampered.