It’s not always about the dead critters on your real, but the live ones inside it

If you’re such an animal lover that you not only don’t eat meat but also sue Burger King because their Impossible Whopper is grilled in the same area as their regular hamburgers, then you should probably stop reading now. You’re going to be offended and hur,t and will have to drown your anger with a cold kale milkshake later. Save yourself the trouble.

This column is for the kind of people who don’t get angry when they smell a nearby grill firing up — the kind of folks like me who sniff the air and say, “Mmm, somebody’s grilling!”

I’ve been grilling as long as I can remember. I’ve gone back and forth between charcoal and propane, repeatedly. I much prefer grilling over charcoal for the taste, but right now I have a gas grill for convenience and because I got tired of buying 20 bags of charcoal over the same span I’d go through one tank of gas.

I do my grilling in a little covered porch with a bar attached to my outside shed. It’s a little bit of a she-shed on the inside and a he-shed where the grill is with all kinds of beautifully tacky souvenirs from our travels.

A few times I’ve had to contend with intruders in the grilling area. There’s a shelf that birds have become particularly fond of as a nest-building site. They’ll build a nest in one day, and I’ll toss it. I know there is some poor male bird out there saying, “Honey, I swear I built the thing right here. I don’t know what happened.”

“Uh-huh. I’ve seen the way you look at that chickadee. You better get your act together.”

And I’ve had a few snakes take a look around. One this year decided to wrap around a standing fan I have there and then fell on my arm when I moved the fan. Fortunately, it was non-venomous even though I squealed as if it were a black mamba.

“Kobe Bryant tried to bite you?” my wife asked.

“Yes, I’m lucky to be alive. Good thing he only had a 44% chance of hitting me.”

Last week, I went to the grill in the dark while carrying a plate of meat. I set the meat on the bar, squatted down to turn on the gas, made a loud noise to scare away black mambas and hit the ignition. While the burners caught fire, I got situated for another normal night of grilling. It would not be normal.

I noticed a strange flame emerging from the grill. I thought it was a spider web or bird nest on fire. Nope. It was a small possum. It didn’t holler. It didn’t even move. It just looked at me like, “Is it hot in here?”

I then proceeded to blow out my possum — and, yes, I know it’s “opossum” but I’m cutting back on my unnecessary Os. I don’t know if you’ve ever had your possum blown out, but it’s quite the spectacle. I debated whether to get him out and go back to grilling, but I knew if my wife asked what new flavor I added to the steak, she would not be happy with the answer, “Oh, that’s singed possum hair.”

Women seem to have something against possums and raccoons when it comes to eating. I think my mom needed therapy after my dad and I went coon hunting and he cooked the coon in the oven. Barbecued coon is mighty good, and so is possum, albeit slightly greasy — about as greasy as the look on a possum’s face.

Needless to say, my wife has had me de-possuming my grill ever since. I never thought I’d have to de-possum anything. Then again, I never thought I’d have to blow out a possum, either.

Get more from Chris Johnson at KudzuKid.com.