or why I'm too tired to cook today. ;-)
Our inside cat, Bella woke us up at about 5:00 this morning meowing at something. She's usually pretty quiet so of course I had to get up and see what was going on. She was looking out the window and when I turned on the porch light, there was a little possum on our windowsill. Generally that's where we feed the outside cats so when they saw the light on, they both came running from the barn. I let the dogs out too, hoping to scare the thing away. Well, that works with raccoons and squirrels (btdt) but possums, they play dead. They may take one step but then they slump over and look for all the world like they are dead. ::shake head:: Apparently, as annoying as it is to humans, it works well with dogs. Both dogs (and both are hunting dogs, I might add) acted as if they didn't notice this odd, smelly thing on our porch. They even ran up to give Sam a friendly sniff without giving the lump of possum so much as a backwards glance! These are the dogs that generally rejoice in the opportunity to roll in smelly, dead things. ::sigh::
Not surprisingly, cats are smarter than dogs. Sam knew that this situation was just plain wrong and that this odd creature certainly did not belong in the vicinity of his food dish but he wasn't quite sure what to do about it. The possum wasn't sure either. When the dogs were near, he'd play dead but apparently he knew the cats weren't buying it so he just backed himself into a corner and hissed a lot. Sam batted at the possum with his paw a few times but even though he's pretty young, he was a little leary of all those sharp teeth so he didn't get much closer. Of course, by then the food bowl was empty. Judging by the way he acts toward the other cats and the dogs, I think he'd have been a bit more forceful if there was food at stake. ;-) Both Callie, the other barn cat, and Bella, the indoor cat, were meowing and pacing around the whole time.
Eventually, as my patience was wearing thin, Sophie came running back to the porch, surprising the possum, who turned around and hissed before falling over into a slump. Too late for the possum though. Sophie acted totally surprised (despite the fact that this ordeal went on for 45 minutes!) and finally noticed the varmint on the porch. She jumped up and looked at it and then grabbed it and ran out to the yard and let it go. Fortunately for the possum, it decided that the dead act wasn't working any more and it ran out into the night.
Dd and I were able to get back to bed but now all motivation is gone.
Maybe tomorrow.
1 comment:
Sounds like you had quite a morning. Reminds me of how our lab used to love leaving presents (aka dead possums) on our porch for us after she'd had her fun with them and how it was always my job to clean them up.
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