So here is a fun story for y'all.
last night around 1:30am, Pepsi was barking incessantly so I went out with the flashlight to check the sitch out. Right there in the middle of the yard facing Pepsi down was a big ole nasty opossum. So I picked up a sandwedge that I have out there and decided to help Pepsi dispatch the opossum from the yard. My main thing was to get it out of the yard so that Pepsi didn't really tangle with it and get bit herself.
I couldn't catch Pepsi, but I tried to hold her at bay by putting the golf club between the opossum and the dog. everytime that I did that, the opossum walked closer toward me and deeper into the yard. These things are clearly not smart considering it could have retreated up a tree that was only a few feet away. Mrs. McKie then joined me with another flashlight and a pitching wedge. We scrambled about and every time that the opossum would move toward either one of us, Mrs. McKie would scream a bit. I am sure that the neighbors had to be amused by the cacaphony of the barking dog, screaming woman, yelling man and hissing opossum.
I finally figured out that herding the opossum toward the fence wasn't going to work, so I decided to use the club as it was intended and pitched the opossum toward the fence. Damn! those things are heavy. I only moved the thing about 3 yards and was in deep rough with a terrible lie for the next shot. Pepsi solved that by using that opportunity to grab the opossum by the neck and run toward the corner of the yard. Predictably, the opposum curled up and died. Mouth open, tongue falling out to one side. Pepsi dropped the opossum rather quickly, but got it within putting distance of the fence by the neighbor's tennis court. Meanwhile, Mrs. McKie was saying "omigod, she killed it, she killed it" and started walking closer. I told her to back off, that it was playing "possum". This didn't register right away with Mrs. McKie, because she was now kneeling down to check it out (by the way, opossums have the raunchiest stench). I said "Mrs. McKie, get back, IT IS NOT DEAD". Mrs. McKie was able to catch Pepsi at this point, so the first thing I wanted to do was get her inside and check for any blood. (opossum was still playing possum at this point).
Went in....no blood, good. But I wanted this stinking giant marsupial rat out of my yard. I grabbed a pan of cold water, my sand wedge and the flashlight and went back out to call the possums bluff. He was still there so I doused him with the water. This caused him to raise his head a little, so I was convinced of my diagnosis of "alive", but he still was trying to convince me he was dead. So I bonked him a couple of times on the head with the club and that got his attention. But still he wouldn't move from his spot in the corner. Finally I gave up and figured that he would make his way out of the yard if I just left.
Which he did, much to Pepsi's disappointment. |
