Playin' Possum

Letting Maddy and Zoe out last night, I hear this great doggy rustling in the back yard. Of course, I have no lights, and there was not a great deal of ambient night light, and I was barefoot, so I was not overly inclined to go and investigate. Zoe ruffled about a bit; leaves went in the air; and I only heard Zoe. Plus, she came when I called, so I wrote it off.

Later on, I had been mentioned her strange behavior to Mr. Manners when it occurred to me that last year, in about that area of the yard, there had been a baby possum. I remarked that I hoped that wasn't the case, as I went down to take the dogs out one last time before bed.

Oh, it was the case.

Zoe was too quiet; in fact, when she ran by me all I saw was a pink tail dangling from her mouth.

"DAMNIT DOG! STOP! DROP THAT!"

And quite obediently, she did, and she went upstairs. Maddy either a) doesn't care or is b) too dumb to care, and so quietly and probably curiously stood behind me and waited. The little possum - not a cute, white one like you see on tv, no, this was a full on mangy, dirty, dog slobbered on, wet, grody possum, blinked at me and wrinkled a paw, and I think I might have screamed for Mr. Manners and curled up behind the metal door.

Like a two pound, if that, possum infant was going to overcome it's likely fatal wounds, jump five foot five inches into the air and attack me viciously. And blindly gnaw my face off.

Shit, it probably thought I was it's mother.

But Mr. Manners disposed of him in as humane a way as possible. Injured baby possum has either crawled off or has been eaten.

More importantly, he is not in my yard, nor is he hidden in my bedroom as a doggy tasty treat.