Me and the Marsupial

So I came walking up to my house Saturday, to see that the porch door was left open, and a 'possum was hanging from one of the window screens--on the inside.

I hate 'possums. Well--that's too strong. Let's just say that I have a distaste for the Virginia Opossum that borders on disgust. Their strange little marsupial teeth, their nasty disposition, their rat like tails, everything about them makes me wish that I didn't have to deal with them. And now, one of the nasty little buggers was hanging from the window screen, inside my porch.

Simple problem, I thought. I picked up the broom and gave him a swat to get min off of my screen before his primitive, un-evolved protomamalian claws could ruin it. I expected him to run off the porch at that point. Instead he darted over to the corned and hid under the furnishings. Fair enough, it was a young 'possum, and I did outweigh it by a factor of about 100. I guess if an 1800 pound giant swatted me with a broom, I 'd go hid under something too. I went inside to give the nasty little bugger a chance to flee.

A couple of hours later I came out on the porch, and saw he was still there. (Now this is one of the reasons that I don't like living in town. If I lived in a rural environment, I could simply take the .22 and shoot the nasty little bugger dead. But I can't do that in town!) So take a quick look around, and pick up my can of "Gun Scrubber", a proprietary aerosol that removes carbon and fouling from fire arms, and sprayed his nasty little butt with it. Now this stuff stinks, and gives the skin a sensation similar to Ben Gay or other rubificient, I thought he'd leave to get away from it. I go back inside.

Later, I go out on the porch, and yep, he's still there. Next step? I get my walking stick, and poke him with it. If I can't kill the nasty little bugger, I don't want to injure it--I'm ruthless, but not cruel. He doesn't budge. At this point, I have decided he's showing an admirable tenacity, worth of a fanatical resistance fighter, the Polish Home Army, or perhaps even some sort of protomamalian jihadist. I have spent time and several attempts to get inside of his decision loop and get him to run away. Now the gloves come off.

I went inside, and got a Swiffer. these devises have a loop on the end of the handle to facilitate hanging them in a closet. I tied some garden twine to the loop, the fed it back through to make a catch pole. Enlisting my eldest daughter to provide the needed arms, we went back to the porch.

By this time the 'possum doesn't even need to think--he's hissing and snapping at us as he sees us coming. It's time to be decisive! My daughter picks up the item he was hiding under, and I slip the noose of the catch pole over his head. The nasty little bugger slipped the noose, and darted for another piece of cover. A sharp whack with the catch pole repositioned him for the noose. This time I pulled it tight, regardless of his health. I tried then to simply lead him to the door, but oh no! he wasn't going for it. At that point, I picked him up off of the floor by the expedient of raising the catch pole and carried the enraged 'possum, hissing and snapping all the way, to the door where I released the tension on the cord and let him. drop to the steps.

One would think, that after all this harsh treatment he would have fled. Instead he tried to re-enter the porch! Fortunately, my eldest has the sensibilities of a farm wife, and gave him two sharp whacks with the broom, which finally convinced him to make a run for the line of holly trees that mark the north boundary of our yard.

I hate 'possums!