Marsupials Of Unusual Size

Sunday Night was the Messiah Sing-A-Long, and the girls had (wisely) opted to watch Animal Planet rather than sit through the 1.5 hours of Handel's genius.  That would mean that they would be left walking my dog, and to be kind to them (and Blitz), I took him out one last time before I went to warm up.  A few feet from the basement door was this unfriendly visitor.
Being the good mom that I am, I called for the girls to come down and see the possum (calling up, "Don't come down without my camera!")

Blitz the yellow-bellied white dog actually found some courage and went to confront the possum (that's his ear and curly tail above).  We couldn't get it to run away, despite poking at it with a stick, and though it was most likely groggy from having just woken up (there was much angry hissing), we feared that rabies might be involved, and not wanting to take any chances, warned the girls to just walk the dog in the front yard if need be.  We had an important lesson on why friendly wild animals are dangerous wild animals.

Notice the naked, scaly tail and crazy toes.  The average-sized possum was gone by morning.