“Argh,” I growled, “There’s another one!”

I fanned my hands through the air violently to prevent a fruit fly from landing on the edge of my drink.

“What the heck is going on?” I asked in a huff. “Where are these things coming from?”

“I don’t know,” Jen responded. “There’s one by me, too.”

I hopped from my chair, exhaling another guttural snarl, and headed to the kitchen with the intention of getting a paper towel. I was going on the hunt. I intended to walk around slapping my hands together near every light like a “Clapper” tester until each of these little buggers lay dead. The paper towel was to collect the corpses.

I arrived in the kitchen and reached for the paper towel, only to disturb a significant swarm resting upon an unusually dark banana on the countertop. With the tearing swoosh of the paper towel, the swarm took to flight like a Biblical plague set upon consuming the landscape.

“What the…?!” I stumbled backward and shouted. “I found ’em!”

I grabbed a plastic grocery sack and then reached into the rolling black sky of insect doom now returning to the banana. I grabbed the evil fruit, almost sure that I saw a lightning flash from within the swarm, shoved it into the bag, and ran to the deck to toss it into the yard.

“This house is clean,” I said.

But it wasn’t.

Within the gentle confines of our beloved domicile hid a remnant of the demon pestilence—tiny, silent, not too fast, but hard to smoosh. I learned that my hands are far too big, and as I bring them together in a slap, the fruit fly gets carried through on the air current being forced out. What I couldn’t figure out was why they appeared more interested in my Scotch than Jen’s lemonade. Now and then, one would fly past her, but it was no bother because it was on its way to my whisky.

We finally got the bright idea to petition the internet for aid. We learned that these little sinners are pretty content to do one of two things: mate or enjoy fermenting delights, most notably decaying fruit.

“Well, that makes sense,” I said with less intensity than before. “Mating or drinking. I can appreciate that.”

“Hah.” Jen punched me in the arm.

That one was pretty much teed up for me.

The recommended solution was to pour a little apple vinegar into a rock glass, take a plastic sandwich bag and cut a small hole in one of the corners, wrap it around the top of the glass and fasten it with a rubber band. Next, you push the corner with the hole down into a cone shape just above the liquid. Apparently, this trap is designed to attract the fruit flies down to the vinegar. They find their way in but are not bright enough to find their way out. Done.

Drink up, boys. This is your last frat party on earth.

I tried this. I monitored it carefully. It failed miserably. In fact, every time I set my Scotch down, I found I was swatting these crazed drunkards away. What’s more, at one point, I returned to find a few on the edge of the glass and one floating dead in the golden glory.

“Arrgghhhh!”

And then I had an idea – a brilliant idea. I’ll reveal it in just a moment.

I want you to know that I drank that whisky with the dead fruit fly in it anyway. I had to. It was the Caol Ila Stitchell Reserve, and I wasn’t about to waste it. I tried a few times to scoop him out, but he was too small and kept slipping over the edge. In the end, I figured he’d only been eating a banana. I decided he was quite small, a little extra protein wouldn’t hurt me, and since this particular edition is nearly 60%, the alcohol would sterilize the whole tragedy. Heck, if kids can eat worms and survive, I can swallow a fruit fly a little bigger than the size of a sand grain and be okay.

Bug or not, the nose of this edition is heavenly – the perfect drink for an autumn evening. It’s an unpeated island whisky, so without the expected island nip, there’s less distraction for sensing the same thing the fruit flies were after—a warmed phenol fruit and honey mixture.

By the way, down he went in the first sip. Again, bug or not, the palate was a bit unctuous, yet this seemed to be a good thing. The oil coated the tongue, allowing for a more precise discernment concerning the fruit—warmed grape jelly, a tiny bit of dark chocolate, and a passing malt.

The finish is long, but you should expect that from the higher-octane whiskies. The jelly dissipated, but the chocolate and malt stayed till the end.

So, do you want to know how I managed to rid our home of fruit flies? Well, I poured these fine fellows a tiny bit of the Stitchell Reserve, placed it into the microwave, and waited an hour for them to gather. Let’s just say they were ushered into the next life in style.