It was a very woodsy... tall trees, narrow pathways, quiet apart from the howling of the crazy wind and the rustling of leaves.
Anyway, we were high up on the hills and Dina spotted this sign that she wanted me to take a picture of. So she went behind it to pose and I walked toward the sign, ready to snap some pictures. And all of a sudden, I saw her eyes dart to the empty spot beside me. When she turned back to me, there was a strange smile on her face; almost like she was concealing a secret. A secret I knew I didn't want to know.
"Later, I'll you something..." she told me calmly.
My mind instantly cooked up a grotesque image of a huge spider or ugly toad inching toward my feet.
"Oh, okay," I nodded. Then I turned around and fled. Dina and Rob were laughing at my reaction.
"It's okay! It's just a possum!" Rob said.
Oh, just a possum. I imagined a cute squirrel-looking creature nibbling an acorn on the ground. (I've always thought possums looked like squirrels anyway)
So I turned around and saw this:
And I freaked out. I screamed. I was expecting a cute possum, not a dead possum.
I never knew I had the tendency to be dramatic anyway.
I calmed down eventually, of course. After 20 seconds of cringing at the thought that I'd just been standing inches away from a stinking dead possum.
Dead possums are not cute. In fact, now that I've seen a possum, I don't think possums look like squirrels anymore. Possums are way bigger and they have sharp little teeth that could bite off a finger if you tried to pet them. But who would ever want to pet a possum? :/
So yeah. As the wind whistled through the barren branches at Emerald Park on that fine Monday morning, I had my first not-so-epic encounter with a dead possum.
That was also the day I rescued Woody the pine cone from the woods. But that's another story ;)
Here's to another busy week ahead. Let's hope January goes easy on all of us, okay?
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