Funny Story and Thank You For all The B-Day Wishes

First, I want to thank all of you for the birthday wishes!  I am so touched.

My birthday started off at 2:30 am with my dog, Sophie and a possum!  Sophie has Poochie Bells on the back door that she rings to let me know she has to go outside.  So at 2:30 am, she rang the bells and I got up to let her out.  I opened the door to see a possum slinking by under the bird feeder.  I thought it would just run up the fence, like the squirrels do to escape Sophie.  Despite her size, Sophie loves to stalk and chase squirrels, cats, and birds.    Sophie jumped off the steps in one leap and was on the possum in two seconds.  Patting him/her with her feet!  The thing flipped on it’s side and was stiff as a board with its eyes closed and mouth open!  At first, I thought it was dead, but then I remember reading books like Don’t Laugh Joe, that possums play dead.  I ran out in my pj’s to grab her and get her away from it.  It could have fleas or some sort of disease and what if it came back to life and bit her?!   So finally, I caught her and brought her back inside to wait for it to come back to life.  It did and scuttled on to what I thought was under the fence where the squirrels escape.  Instead, as I found out upon letting Sophie out again, it just went two more feet and played dead in the garden.  Ugh!  I had to catch Sophie all over again.  Back to the house, to wait again.  So this time we waited until I was sure it had left the yard and escaped under the gate.  Sophie was having a heart-attack that I was letting this varmint get away.  So once, the coast was clear, I let her out again.  She still had not gone to the bathroom!
I waited by the door for her and after a few seconds, I realized I did not see her in my yard.  She had squeezed her 8lb body under the fence to hunt down the possum!  I ran out again in my pajamas.  This time I was chasing her all over the neighborhood.  Luckily I was wearing my faux Ugg leopard slippers from Target, with their rubber soles.  My pajamas were not matching, with cat fleece bottoms and a red sweatshirt top.  All I could think as I chased her around the neighborhood was that someone was going to call the cops on this crazy lady running around the neighborhood at 2:30 am!  As I chased her around and she seemed to laugh at me as I did, I was hoping someone would call the cops!  Maybe they could help me catch her.  I tried everything: “sit,” “want a treat,” “look who’s here,” and “that’s it I’m leaving you out here alone, bye!”  The little snot checked the front of my house saw no one was there and kept running.  Finally, I got some freeze dried chicken and threw it into my backyard.  She went for it and I shut the gate and shoved old Ugg boxes against the gap under the fence.  I was frazzled and she probably had the best night of her life!  Some start to my b-day!