Possum Stew

Now, before you run away gagging…let me just say that possum (or opossum to some of you) stew is one of the finer things in life. NOT! Ha. Gotcha! I can’t say that I’ve actually ever had possum stew, nor would I ever choose to do so. But here’s a good story and I had to lead up to it somehow…

The other evening whilst sitting on the couch I noticed a faint scratching noise that sounded like it was coming from the front windows in my living room. As I turned the volume down on the tv, sure enough, it WAS a scratching sound coming from underneath the windows. I looked outside but couldn’t see anything rustling in the bushes. I knocked on the window. Still nothing. So, because I am a big chicken and thought that it surely must be rat in my cellar (even though I have NEVER had a rat in my cellar), I went to bed without looking in the basement.

The next afternoon I heard the scratching again and because it was daylight, and knew the boogie monster wouldn’t get me if I went into the cellar at this time of day, I headed down with a flashlight. I went straight to where I had heard the noise the night before. You see, I have a set of basement windows right underneath the living room windows. These windows are ancient, dirty as hell and double paned. Not the double-paned as in the modern, two pieces of glass that are millimeters apart and make up one window –  but two separate windows that have approximately 3-1/2″ of space between them.

And what to my wondering eyes should appear? Something gray…and hairy…and breathing! Gah! I almost ran away screaming but my curiosity got the best of me. I approached slowly with the flashlight and as I got closer I realized it was a baby possum. Phew! I could barely see in the widows as they are covered in dirt. Very clever how they installed them so there is absolutely NO way to clean them. Anyway, as I inspected further I could see that next to the little possum was what used to be his/her sibling. Splayed out. Dead. With flies crawling all over it.

I ran back upstairs fretting about what to do. My child got wind of my anxiousness and asked what was wrong. I had to tell her. And then she started crying, insisting that we had to “SAVE” him “NOW”. Great.

I grabbed a hammer and headed outside to see if I could somehow break the window open without killing the poor thing. No luck. That glass would not budge. I couldn’t really take a good whack at it as I was afraid the hammer would end up in the possum’s skull. So, I called my Dad and he came to the rescue with his expert glass-breaking technique. We coaxed the little fella out with cat food. It leaned out of the window just enough to gobble up the food. I’m sure it wouldn’t move any further because we were all standing around gawking at it. My child, of course, thought it was cute and wanted to keep it. It started to show its teeth when we moved closer. My first inclination was to whack it with something. Nice. I just save the poor, starving animal and now I want to kill it.

I have no idea how long it had been inbetween the windows. Long enough for two of his siblings to die. Yes, two! After he climbed out we saw that there was another dead baby – he had been sitting on it. Ick. So, now I have a broken basement window full of dead stank. I wonder how long it will take for the bodies to disintegrate, because I sure as hell am not going to touch that stuff! Can I interest anyone in some possum carcass for stew??

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Feisty Friday

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Feisty Friday

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I ♥ NY…sometimes

The weather in New York state is all but predictable. A few days ago I woke to find the thermometer reading -5 degrees. Holy shit, that’s cold even for a born and bred Northerner. Then, a few days later it’s a whopping 50 degrees. Yep, that’s right. And people wonder why I’m so cranky.

Since it had warmed up so much I figured it was about time that I took the rotting pumpkin off my front porch and threw it in the compost pile. I was finally able to make my way out the back door, across the deck (which now only has about one foot of compacted snow/ice on it as opposed to the 3 feet of snow it had on it a week ago) and out to the compost pile behind the garage. But…not without incident. You see, as I approached the steps leading down to the backyard my heel hit a piece of ice and WHHHHOOOOOSH! There I went. Sliding at full speed down the steps (which were actually more like an ice slide since I hadn’t shoveled them in months) and landing with a hard cruuunch on my ass. Ouch. Surprisingly enough, I didn’t drop the pumpkin. It was still planted firmly in my hands which meant that my ass took a terrible beating since I didn’t use my hands to break the fall. I started laughing, as I often do when I do something foolish and get hurt. Both of the dogs were outside and Gus came rushing to my side, licking my face as I laughed hysterically. I was still lying on the ground when I looked up to see this coming at me:

Yeah. Crazy. Ferocious. Dog.

Ridley gets spastic in the snow and it didn’t help that his mom was lying there laughing, holding a pumpkin. He came bounding toward me and pounced right on top of me. Barking and nipping like his Borderline Collie self. He then decided this was going to be a get-the-pumpkin game and started coming at me from all sides trying to pry the rotting pumpkin from my hands. This made me laugh even harder. And then it happened. I peed my pants. Oh, come on! Don’t tell me that if you fell on your ass into the cold, melting snow you, TOO, wouldn’t wet yourself!

By the time I got myself up and walked into the house, tears were streaming down my cheeks from laughing so hard. My child just looked at me, shook her head in disgust and in her motherly tone said, “What is wrong with you?” I didn’t have the heart to tell her the truth so I crept upstairs and hit the shower. Damn weather. Damn dogs. Damn bladder.

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And here we go…

Every year the fifth grade class at my daughter’s school has a week-long unit on sex education.  My daughter is in fifth grade this year. Oh, joy!

It’s a pretty basic, straight-forward unit. The kids spend a week learning about self-confidence, grooming, puberty, reproduction, etc. At the end of the week there is an evening presentation that is to be attended by both parents and students. So, one evening we all cram into one of the little fifth grade rooms, sit in the chairs that are far too small for our adult asses and listen to the presentation. Most of the kids sit next to their parents. My daughter and several of her friends know what is coming and are too embarrassed to sit next to their parents so they pull up seats close to the front of the room.

The presentation consists of summarizing what our children have learned throughout the week, followed my a short video explaining puberty, sexual intercourse and child birth…in graphic detail. The pictures and information were shot at them so fast it left most gape-mouthed and blushing. But the boys in the back of the room…they were bursting out in fits of giggles. One of the boys was giggling so hard it was difficult to ignore. I attempted to hold in my laughter but as the boys rolled in the aisles when the words “penis”, “vagina” and “erection” were mentioned, I shook uncontrollably and a few chuckles escaped my lips. So much for being a good roll model.

By far, the best part was after the video when I happened to hear the boy sitting next to me say to his father, in a very matter-of-fact manner, “I knew all of this stuff already”. I just about choked. Turns out, the boy is on my daughter’s “Boys I Like List”. As we left the room, I tugged at her arm and whispered in her ear, “Stay away from Dxxxxx”. God, that’s ALL I need!

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