By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN New York Times BRASSTOWN, N.C. -- The lights are strung, the stage is set and Baby New Year is waiting in a cage, hissing. Brasstown, once again, is ready for the Possum Drop. Yes, the annual New Year's Eve Possum Drop, the one and only, inspired by the dropping of a certain illuminated ball 670 miles away. At the stroke of midnight, at the exact same moment that hundreds of thousands of people holler in the New Year at Times Square in New York, and millions more tip back champagne flutes and watch it on television, a...