Okay, think of it differently. Your alarm clock goes off, you are tired, sleepy, not really awake yet. You turn over and get out of bed. On the floor, about a foot away next to your slippers is a Possum playing dead. Do you: A Calmly walk out of the room ignoring the possum? B Frantically jump away as your blood is pumped full of Adrenaline C Instantly pull your 9mm from under the pillow and perforate the creature. I'm gonna guess most of us go with B unless we are real nut cases (c) or just robots (a). Doesn't matter that the possum didn't move to attack you, and that playing dead is indeed their normal behavior. You found an animal that COULD be dangerous to you in a place you expect to feel safe. After-all, how many people expect to find a possum next to their toilet when their drawers are down. Do you take the risk of carrying the bucket without some way to trap the possum in the bucket? I didn't have a box or anything else I could force the possum into so I improvised using the plunger to hold it in the bucket while I walked it outside. I had plenty of stuff on hand to smash the ever-living crap out of it and kill it with blunt force, but honestly I didn't want to kill it mainly because I don't like killing things larger than bugs, and I didn't want to clean up after the mess I made. Was easier just to get it out of the house and carry it far enough that it wouldn't go back into the house.