By Tom Hand
I have a 69 Barracuda fastback. After 40 years of a blue interior, I decided to change over to black. I bought all new components: headliner, door panels, carpet, seat upholstery, and some trim. While the interior was out, I guess monkeys let a creature come in the garage. But, unlike monkeys, he was smart. He crawled into an open door, went back to the trunk, and then scurried over the wheel well and got up next to the outer skin and behind the rear side panels. He lived in the car for day or so. I kept hearing things in the garage and finally saw footprints that looked not like a cat, nor a monkey, but instead, a creature of unknown origin.
One day, we found the trash dumped over in the garage. It was time to act. We rolled the car outside and started inspecting. No monkey. No cats. No dog. No raccoon. Got my hunter friend Wayne over. We got Julian the mechanic over just in case. We had a small hunting party until we saw that long tail barely visible inside the car. I removed a front/side panel and stuck a screwdriver in. Here he was: Mr. Opossum.
He scampered toward the rear but could not get all the way out quickly because of my battery mounted in the trunk (a monkey did not put it there; I did it in 1979 for weight purposes). Wayne, the great hunter, reached in with a leather gloved hand and grabbed the tail of the creature. Mr. Opossum was all alone and had no longer had monkeys to help him. All the while we had screaming and laughing and great excitement.
Since the opossum was not really guilty, he did not deserve punishment as it was me that had the car apart and the doors open. So, we put him in a bucket and got him down by the creek to let him go. Mr. Policeman saw us and stopped to see what the heck we were doing in the creek bed. After a few laughs, he was good to go. All in all, it was a grand time.
Those monkeys and their friends.
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