Mr Cranky the Christmas Possum

On the eve of Christmas, Thomas complained that the rags that had been stuffed up the chimney in his bedroom had fallen down, making a mess in the room that he had painstakingly cleaned. Jokes were made that it was clearly in preparation for an influx of reindeer that night.

Fast forward to mid morning on Christmas Day and Thomas came to see me to complain with a broad grin on his face that there appeared to be reindeer poo in his room. I went down to investigate and sure enough there was a distribution of little poo-like pellets in one corner. I  assumed that the same culprits that had left half eaten carrots at the front door were responsible, told Thomas to clean it up and thought no more of it.

Fast forward to after dinner. Everyone has wound down with guts full of turducken and is relaxing around the table in post dinner christmas bliss. Caroline goes down to Thomas' bedroom and he shows her the same evidence (it was a bit much to expect it to actually be cleaned up). While Caroline is in there, she moves the wardrobe door that was next to the area where the poo was and screams when a possum appears. It quickly retreated into the deepest darkest corner of the wardrobe that it could and Caroline came down seeking reinforcements.

Enter Turtleman Dave.

Full of bluff, bluster and perhaps a little Christmas spirit (of the drinking kind) I grabbed a washing basket and a towel, intending to catch the possum, dump it into the basket, cover it with the towel and happily dump it somewhere outside the house.

I cleared an area to give me access and dived into the wardrobe with the towel, grabbing at the possum as best I can. As it turned out, I grabbed the first bit of it that I could, which turned out to be the tail. I hauled him out and attempted to dump him into the washing basket. He caught the edge though and clung on for dear life. I held his tail, he held the basket with his front claws. ApparentIy he didn't really like being held by the tail and got a little cranky. I tried to wrap the towel around him to end the stalemate and get him inside the basket.

The instant I managed that and went to cover him with the towel, he bolted for freedom and disappeared under Thomas' bed.

It was on!

Once again I cleared some space and then hands and towel before me, plunged head first under the bed. This time rather than grabbing him by the tail, I managed to grab him around the torso and then dragged him out. This time I wasn't silly enough to bother with baskets, I just held on as best I could and took him outside. I made sure I walked him a couple of houses down the block and stuck  him up a tree. Unfortunately the tree trunk was short of bark and after scrambling up a metre or so above my head height he plummeted back to earth only to shoot off across the road and up another tree.

Nothing like a bit of excitement to bring Christmas to life!