Concerning possums

We had some people round last night to go visit our possums (well, they're their own possums, but we like to think of them as ours). Ryan and Lis (pronounced Liz) from Leslie's course came, as well as Ryan's fiancee, Sara. The possums are only three or four minutes away, so they're a great tourist attraction for our neighbourhood. I just hope the council doesn't kill (or "relocate") them as they say they will, because what will we do then on a Friday night?

The possums must have thought all their Christmases had come at once. We brought them three bags of bread rolls and a three kilo bag of apples, and we weren't the only group of people feeding them that night. There is a direct corrolation between how brave a possum is and how fat it is. The skinny ones are the timid ones that you can see up the trees, and the big fat ones come sit in your lap. They don't seem to mind being touched, as long as you give them some food for their trouble. You can stroke them like cats as the nibble away on bread and sit on your lap.

A few words about possums, since a lot of people seem to be horrified that we're getting close to them at all. The Australian possum is not the same as the North American opossum (pictured at right), which seems a nasty little creature. The two are in fact not at all related, though they look somewhat similar and that is what gives the Australian possum its name. "Possum," in North American parlance, is slang for the Virginia opossum. Opossums, when threatened, "play possum," that is, play dead. Australian possums do not exhibit this behaviour - when they are threatened they make a low gutteral growling noise, the sound we heard from them the first night we went to see them. Another thing Australian possums do not do is carry rabies. In fact, no animals in Australia carry rabies - it is a rabies-free country, which is why bringing pets in is so difficult.

These possums seem very friendly and harmless. They play the same ecological role in Australian wildlife as the squirrel plays in European and North American wildlife. The ones in the park down the street from us are friendly and harmless, and there is no cause for alarm.

In temping news, I was at the Department of Justice this week, sorting through 13,000 pieces of paper. I was chatting to the other temp with whom I was working, and she said she'd lived in Paris for nine years. She said she'd met a boyfriend over there, a Scot, and he'd come back to Australia with her. She's been back in Australia for eight or nine years. She spoke of the boyfriend in the past tense, and since she said "boyfriend" and not "husband," I assumed the relationship had not worked out. I asked her if the boyfriend was still living in Australia, or if he'd gone back to Scotland or France. She said no, he had died of a sudden heart attack in their bed less than a year ago and that she had been a complete wreck ever after, and this was her first foray into the working world since then. Boy, did I ever wish we hadn't gone down that road. For the rest of the two days, most things we talked about seemed to bring up memories of him. I said I was sorry to hear about the death, but what else is there to say? It was an uncomfortable situation all round.

If you get the chance, check out Karl Rove rapping at the White House Correspondents Dinner. It is beyond cringe-inducing - it's one of the most horrifying things I've seen in a very long time. I'd like to have a serious talk with whoever thought that this was a good idea.