Betty defeats the pesky miller moths

I have a black coffee maker in my kitchen, which is my first destination every morning.

Allow me to clarify.

Yes, it makes black coffee, but the coffee maker itself is black, which I mention because the dark color makes it a favored hiding spot of our pesky spring visitors, the miller moths.

I don’t need to tell many of you that we’ve been host to a bumper crop of those vile critters this year.

Even for a woman like me who keeps her rose-colored glasses on the nightstand so they can be put on first thing every morning, they’ve been a trial.

I don’t have an occasional individual fluttering merrily around a lamp … or even a few dozen at one time. I battle them in the hundreds and sometimes thousands. My old house has the equivalent of revolving doors when it comes to miller time.

They have many favorite nooks and I think I know them all: behind framed pictures, tucked in the battery case of the clock in the bathroom, hidden in the folds of drapes, crammed around door frames waiting to shower the unsuspecting person who tries to enter or exit … and inside that black coffee maker.

For a solid month each spring, before I start the morning brew, I have to inspect for hidden moths.

They love to crawl into the bottom of the water reservoir, or sidle into the edge of the brew basket. They have no aversion to plunging directly into the carafe either, whether or not it contains coffee.

I got up early a few days ago to write this column and was perhaps a little groggier than usual when I began the morning moth rounds.

Using the flashlight function on my telephone, I peered deep into the dark and empty reservoir and sure enough, there were two moths huddled in the bottom corner.

I picked up the whole coffee maker, turned it upside down, and gave it a hard shake … forgetting that I had bypassed the critical step of first removing the glass carafe.

That carafe fell to the counter and rolled off.

(If we can count on one thing in life, it is gravity.)

But here is the miracle that happened: I CAUGHT IT WITH MY KNEE.

Yes, amazingly my yet-to-be caffeinated reflexes kicked in and I trapped that carafe between my knee and a kitchen cabinet, saving it from dramatically transforming into what would have been at least a million shards … or would have felt like that on my bare feet.

Is there a lesson here?

Some would say the lesson would be to remove the carafe before turning one’s coffee maker upside down.

But I say the lesson is this: Even in the midst of miller madness, good things can happen.

I celebrated with a cup of fresh miller-free coffee.

It’s my favorite kind.

Betty Williamson may have splats on her rose-colored glasses, but she persists. Reach her at:

[email protected]