Anyway, I used my background in systems analysis to draw up a grand plan, using masses of mothballs (which they apparently hate), and a 400-watt ultra-sonic screamer which I'm building. Ingredients for the screamer project:
- one PC running audacity (to generate high-pitched waveforms then mix them with processed random animal sounds and punk bands)
- one old hi-fi amp, connected to the PC
- 15 metres of cable
- two 400-watt horn tweeters, placed at the holes in the roof where the animals go in and out.
It can't fail. I just have to carefully time the activation for when the possums are out feeding. Otherwise, switching it on when they're already in the attic would trap them in there and torture them with noise, like in Iraq.
But as any general will tell you, you need a multi-pronged attack. So first of all I'm building some nesting boxes to hang in the trees, so the animals will have somewhere new to live after eviction. You see? Carrot and stick. What the world needs now.
So I'll be setting the alarm for about 3am one morning next week, before they come home from chewing gum trees. If there's no more posts here, assume I've fallen through the ceiling half-asleep in my pyjamas. I love the night life!
As it happens, there was a possum person in the audience at the concert on Wednesday, the female impersonator Harry Bumfreeze. If only I had asked him for advice, that might have helped. He is currently in New South Caledonia recuperating from an appendix operation, and sadly has had to postpone scheduled appearances in Scotland.
Nobody but the hard core ever comes to this blog now. If I can be bothered after rehousing the possums, I'll launch another exhibitionist blitz, with a genre-busting 3-D HNT.
