Love your 'relief of his living daylights'. They are pretty classic little animals. I've always enjoyed them. Particularly if you get to see them up close. The chubby little pink fingers really crack me up. Used to have one mess around outside the sliding glass door, so got to watch close-in for a long time, without bothering him/her.
Amazing a 'play dead' routine has worked for SO long. Then again, if you smell bad, someone probably WOULDN'T bother to eat you, even if you WERE playing as still as a nice dinner meal.
Hey! I missed this reply earlier. I do like possums, but they kind of scare me-- the way they don't skitter away like most wild animals when they see me. They come fearlessly waddling onto the patio and then ignore the human (me) who's standing there.
Possums kinda look like they ALWAYS smell bad!