We tried to get the fat lizard, and here's what happened.

Ricky and I continued to experience ambivalence all weekend about the fat, curly-tailed lizard that was lurking on our patio. We had decided to leave it alone. But then Ricky saw it sunning itself, taunting us. There it was in all its resplendent reptilian-ness. It was near the entrance to one of its hideouts, the tunnel-like hurricane shutter track closest to the screen door.

"Keep your eye on it!" Ricky commanded from the living room as he headed toward the garage.

Watching through the sliding glass door, I kept my eye on it. I had a particularly good view of its super-curly tail, the end that was facing me.

"Okay, lizard butt," I thought to myself. "I'm watching you."

Ricky returned holding a broom and started to touch the lock on the sliding door so he could step out onto the patio. So focused! So brave! As soon as the lock made the opening click sound, the fat lizard zipped right into one of the open ends of its track/tunnel/lair. Ricky was undeterred. He went back to the garage, and this time returned with a second item: a metal tape-measure.

"Okay," Ricky said. "One of us will unspool the tape measure into this side of the track and force the fat lizard to run out the other side. Then, the other one of us will sweep it out the screen door. Which one do you want to do?"

This was a big decision.

"I'll do the sweeping," I said.

We propped the screen door open. Ricky went to the far end of the track, sat down on the floor, and leaned forward so he could thread the tape measure into the opening. It unwound and unwound, further and further into the track, while I waited at the other end, broom poised, watching for the fat lizard to come out.

And then it worked! The fat lizard poked its rather sizable head out! But it took one look at me standing there with the broom and disappeared right back inside.

Ricky started jiggling the tape measure to scare the lizard out. He kept threading more and more tape measure into the tunnel until the metal tip poked out all the way through to the other end. The lizard was still inside.

"This isn't working," I said. "He must have enough room to avoid the tape measure."

I stood forlorn as Ricky began to retract the tape measure. It made it about halfway back. And then it got stuck. Really stuck.

I will stop the story here, because our only victory in this adventure was that after enlisting several more items from the garage and strategizing for about a half hour, we did eventually get the tape measure out. And we did not injure ourselves or break anything. But, THE FAT, CURLY-TAILED LIZARD IS STILL LIVING ON OUR PATIO.