It is amazing how the bellowing of hungry animals can be heard despite no perceptible sound. It is as if I can feel their collective staring eyes boring holes through the walls of the house until I respond with demanded food. Tonight was no different. I go to the barn to feed my supposedly starving animals and look over my 5-foot-high kitty condo tree where I feed my kitties. I usually put their food up there so the chickens don’t beat them to it. Of course, it doesn’t always work as our chickens sense cat kibbles, the goat grain and all llama munchies. If there’s food anywhere within 10 miles, those chickens will find it!
As I approach the cat dish to see if it needed filling up, I notice an unfamiliar and odd furry cat with its back to me, head buried deep in the yummy kitty nibbles. My first thought is, “what is wrong with that cat’s fur, it’s shiny and gray? I don’t remember any of the barn kitties being so odd.” I go over to see the “kitty,” and he turns around to glare at me with beady little eyes and a not-so-cute hiss complete with a gaping toothy grimace! It’s a possum!! I internally scream, “WHAT??!!” My boy kitty is sitting up there with him like they are buddies or something!
It is a young possum, and I relent as I see he is kind of cute, with squinted eyes and a big-boy bravado! He just sat there, with my cat curiously watching, daring me to chase him away. I loudly say to Boy Kitty, “Come on! This is why I hired you! To keep the riff raff away! Now do your job!!” He yawned! He really did, he actually yawned. The friendly possum then let his body go limp, hanging his head over the side as the kitty sat next to him. He was ‘playing possum’ with me! After about a minute, he realized that I wasn’t going to hit him over the head and straightened up, going back to munching away with Boy Kitty! I roll my eyes and turn, thinking this is one for Superfarmer to handle. As I leave, I look over my shoulder to see my boy kitty and his new bud sitting on top of the cat condo sharing a nice dinner. Oh brother. Such is life on Addie Acres. True story!!!
