Mischievous woodchuck reincarnated

It’s like stepping into a time machine and being zapped into the late ’60s. In other words, we’ve already gone this route.

The leading lady in the present day rerun is an energetic bundel of mischief known as Wuffles. She’s an apparent reincarnation of Cuddles, the woodchuck who entertained and exasperated us so many years ago. We always vowed there would never ever be another Cuddles, but Wuffles has stuffed those words down our throats and has us liking it!

When Wuffles, her mother and three siblings devastated the vegetable garden belonging to a resident of a nearby town, the frustrated gardener began slinging lead at the family of munching moochers. Wuffles was the only survivor, thanks to a neighbor who snatched her from the barrage of bullets. Of course, it was altogether natural that she be brought here.

The young chuck was confined to a cage for two or three weeks, then, when she began pushing the cage door out with her strong neck muscles, she was allowed to freely skitter through the house. Like cats, woodchucks dig and cover, so they’re neat house guests. They’ll soak up every word on a newspaper, then shred the paper and pat it over the dampened area.

Wuffles, so named because she wuffle-wuffles like an idling motor bike, no longer requires newspapers because she has her own private relief station in the burrow she’s digging beneath the shower stall in the bathroom!

We’d been hearing clattering and scratching sounds coming from the foundation beneath the bathroom for some time — always when the chuck was out of sight. One day, as I walked by the shower stall, a rock rattled across the floor. I kicked it back under the shower and it came flying out again. Next morning, I couldn’t open the bathroom door because she had piled gravel and rocks behind it.

Wuffles had dug under the pipes and into the layer of gravel, which is the first of a many-layered foundation for our home. It took two men to carry out the first box of gravel and rocks she excavated, and another box is waiting to be removed.

It isn’t what she’s taking out, though, that concerns us as much as it is what she’s taking in. She’s dragging just about anything she can latch onto into the bowels of the earth. She’s carried in such objects as a plate, kettle cover, bathroom plunger, any paper products she can pilfer, potatoes, apples, cucumbers, an oil-filled ear syringe, etc.

Once, I managed to grab my slippers just as they were disappearing beneath the shower stall and found my sneakers wedged there, too — along with part of the dust mop. She pulled the door off the laundry tub — leaving the bolt and spring on the floor. The door is still stuck between the wall and the shower. If we ever get to the bottom of her diggings, we’ll have enough items for a yard sale!

She went a bit too far, though, when she snatched my eye glasses — which is why I’m typing today’s column through the wavy lenses of five and dime store reading glasses!

This morning, Wuffles had a live addition to her burrow. Joe-Joe, a late-born and bottle-fed raccoon, tumbled from his clothes hamper nest and wobbled under the shower stall. There were some wild wuffings and the chattering of chuck chops just before Joe-Joe wobbled back into view. He truly was a picture of a dejected, rejected and ejected guest!