In a bizarre twist of events at Cash’s Liquor Store in Florida, employees stumbled upon a scene straight out of a wildlife comedy last week. Tucked among the shelves was an unexpected visitor: a native opossum, sprawled next to a shattered, empty bottle of bourbon, looking worse for wear after a night of apparent indulgence.
Cash Moore, the store’s owner, recounted the unusual break-in to the Northwest Florida Daily News. “This is a first,” he said, shaking his head. “She must’ve slipped in from outside, climbed the rafters, and knocked a bottle of liquor off the shelf. When she hit the floor, she drank the whole darn thing!” The opossum, later identified as a hefty female, had turned the shop into her personal bar.
When a police officer delivered the inebriated critter to the Emerald Coast Wildlife Refuge, staff knew they had a unique case on their hands. Michelle Pettis, a refuge worker, described the opossum’s condition: “She was pale, disoriented, and drooling excessively—definitely not her usual self.” The team quickly suspected the marsupial had polished off the entire bottle of bourbon found cracked open beside her.
The refuge sprang into action, administering fluids to flush the alcohol from her system. After a few days of TLC, the opossum sobered up, miraculously dodging the dreaded hangover. “She was back to her feisty self in no time,” Pettis noted with a chuckle. The furry booze bandit was soon released, scampering back into the wild, unharmed and presumably wiser.
How the opossum infiltrated the store remains a mystery. Described as “fairly large,” she likely used her size and cunning to sneak in, perhaps drawn by the allure of holiday spirits. The incident left locals buzzing, and the refuge’s Facebook post about the ordeal went viral. Captioned, “On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me: a drunk opossum in a box!” alongside a photo of the bleary-eyed culprit, the post racked up hundreds of likes and shares. “This sly, and currently slurred, opossum snuck its way into a liquor store and discovered some holiday cheer of its own,” the refuge quipped.