I’ve been seeing a lot of posts and reading articles regarding the relieving of command of Captain Brett Crozier of the USS Theodore Roosevelt for sending a letter asking for his sailors to be evacuated from the ship due to a rapidly spreading coronavirus outbreak on board. Now, we don’t have all the details, so don’t know what communications Captain Crozier had with his superiors prior to sending the letter, but when I read this morning that the acting Secretary of the Navy, Thomas Modly went aboard the ship over the weekend and belittled the captain, saying he was “too naive or too stupid to be a commanding officer of a ship like this,” it kinda got me fired up. Videos I saw last week online and on the news showed hundreds of sailors cheering and chanting his name as he departed the ship, showing appreciation for him looking out for their safety. I then see articles and transcripts of this tool Modly going on the ship and chastizing the sailors for cheering for their captain, basically telling them that the media is the enemy, and to stop complaining about his departure and do their jobs. I can’t believe the arrogance of this guy. I can see relieving him of duty or suspending him while an investigation is properly done to determine whether or not he violated laws or leaked confidential information to the public, but to humiliate a 30 year career service member the way this was done is wrong. In my career I had to terminate people, but no matter the reason, I tried to do it so they were treated with dignity and with confidentiality. If this tool had any leadership experience, he would also understand that the captain’s team, 4,000 sailors, would be hurting when they lost someone who had tried to support them by looking out for their safety and because of it lost his job. Thus, his speech was not positively received. I listened to it and after he called the captain “stupid and naive”, you can hear one sailor yell”What the F—?”. During the speech, the acting secretary also uses the “f” word. Just wanted to be one of the guy’s I guess (he did recognize later that it probably was uncalled for and apologized). Another sailor’s reaction following the speech was “he kinda called us pus___es.” Anyhoo, I have a feeling this ain’t over yet.

Received a text from a friend yesterday (who will remain anonymous), asking for my opinion. “Mr. Stout, I’m sending you a photo that explains my dilemma. The POTUS has been very vague on his messages. I’m hoping you can help me.”

“Do you think I should use a thicker scarf, nothing at all or stay with this simple scarf. Confused in _________”. My response was “thank you, I needed a photo for my blog tomorrow.”

Now let’s help him out. You can reply to this post with “thicker,” “nothing at all,” or “stay simple.”

Since this thing started we’ve started drinking more of our wine from “the cellar,” instead of everyday grocery store stuff. Last night I opened a 2012 Marchesi Dolcetto. It held up very well and was perfect wine to go with the ACM Presents: Our Country music special on CBS last night. It was very good (the show and the wine). I just saw that Lady Gaga has put together a music special to be aired on Saturday, April 18th. I’m impressed with the many concerts musicians throughout the country have been putting together in their living rooms. It is fun to see the big name stars, who perform to thousands on a big stage, wearing their jeans and t-shirt in their living room with the family dog laying next to them as they perform. Anyhoo, back to the wine. If I touch my face and die of the coronavirus with 300 bottles of wine in the cellar, I’m gonna be pissed.

Well, gotta go get ready to be uplifted and gander at the 5:00 news. And please don’t forget to help “sweet cheeks” out and let him know what you think about his mask. Stay Healthy, Stay Safe, Stay Home. Have a great evening! Ziggyman

Today is Sunday, Lord’s Day, and I hope my comrades said their prayers this morning, like my friend Lil’ Mikey here.

Anyhoo, I hope y’all are enjoying this sunshine and have an opportunity to get out of the house and do a socially distanced walk before the weather changes. Beautiful up here on the mountain today. The missus and I just got back from a 1.81 mile walk and it really helped to clear the cobwebs from the brain.

I just read an article by Bill Gates titled “What our leaders can do now”, which can be found on GatesNotes, his blog. Over the past couple of months the Gates Foundation has invested $105 million dollars in efforts to create therapeutics for the virus, expand access to testing, and limit the spread in the Seattle area. Yes, he is a very wealthy person, but he’s not buying prostitutes with his riches and I don’t believe he has claimed bankruptcy one single time. His message to our leaders to get us through this and back to some sort of normalcy makes a lot more sense than opening up the country for Easter weekend; stocking up on hydroxychloroquine; putting Jared in charge of anything; and, talking to sports commissioners to get the stadiums and arenas open. He says, first we need to have a consistent nationwide approach to shutting down. Nothing new here, Dr. Fauci and other health professionals have been saying this everyday. Second, the federal government needs to step up on testing. The demand for tests will probably exceed the supply for some time, but there needs to be a greater priority put on this. Finally, we need a data-based approach to developing treatments and a vaccine, and it needs to be done with clinical trials, not a gut hunch that aquarium cleaner will cure the coronavirus. There you have my Cliff Notes of GatesNotes.

With that, I am going to sign off. Remember — Stay Safe, Stay Healthy, and STAY HOME!! Ziggyman

I subscribe to The Southern Review, a quarterly literary journal from Louisiana State University and last night read a piece of poetry by Stephen Gibson titled On a Jimi Hendrix Poster at Seattle’s MoPOP Gift Shop. It kind of reminds me of where things are right now. Probably more frozen than burning.

On a Jimi Hendrix Poster at Seattle’s
MoPOP Gift Shop
When my wife saw Jimi Hendrix at the Fillmore,
she and a girlfriend had run away to San Francisco
and were living with eight others in Haight-Ashbury
after her high school boyfriend was killed in the war,
shot down near some village she didn’t know
the name of —that was when her girlfriend and she
decided to get as far away from everything
they knew as they could. This poster photo
is the one of ’67 Monterey and Jimi
is kneeling over his guitar as it’s burning
like the country.

I wasn’t going to write anything about politics today, but I happened to be reading an article in the Washington Post and while reading the comments, saw a comment by someone referencing Donnie’s daily briefing that was going on at that time. I have avoided watching them after the first few, as it is difficult to sit and watch so much ass kissing and other nasty things by the sycophants standing behind tRump. Not to mention the outright lies. I did turn on the TV and OMG it was even more whacked than ever.

Anyhoo, back to that article in the WAPO. It is basically about DDD, and not Guy Fieri’s Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives. We’re talking Denial, Dysfunction, and Delays. The article presents a timeline from when the administration first learned of the virus in Wuhan to where we are today with over 8,000 deaths in the United States. I suggest you take a look at this and form your own opinion on the stellar leadership that we have working for us. Of course Kellyanne and the Trumpanzies will have alternate reality thoughts. A comment by Airborne82 pretty much hit’s the nail on the head, “Trump’s sabotage of federal agencies and pandemic response teams and months of lying and delaying leads to hundreds of thousands of American deaths, tens of thousands sick, trillions in market losses, millions unemployed, thousands of businesses and schools closed, trillions more in debt, and the fastest rate of infection and death in the world.”

Thank you to Marci and John for stopping by and giving us a nice little treat of cookies to have with our after dinner drinks tonight. Don’t worry, we socially distanced outdoors during the delivery. They have started a new program at home during this lockdown by making a different cocktail each night. When this is over, I don’t know if more of our friends will be going to Alcoholics Anonymous or Weight Watcher meetings. Put away those potato chips and Twinkie’s so you don’t end up like Debbie when this is over.

Okay comrades, take care and practice safe sex social distancing. Ziggyman

Happy Friday, my friends. Glad the weekend is almost here. I think I will just stay home indoors and look at Facebook, and write some ramblings, and read some current events, and try some new cocktails, and cook some different things. Oh, wait, that would just be the same shit, different day. I’ll bet you’ve been reading my mail and doing the same thing.

On a serious note, I want to send a SHOUT OUT to the wonderful folks on the front line who are risking their health by protecting us or making OUR lives a little easier because of what they are doing. These would be doctors, nurses, law enforcement, fire fighters, EMT’s, grocery clerks, postal workers, garbage pickup folks, our service members, truck drivers. I know I haven’t listed them all, but you know who I’m talking about. We need to let them know we appreciate them any way we can.

Yesterday, our friend Tracie brought by some beef brisket that Chef Hornor had done in the new smoker at Skyway Bar and Grill. He has been experimenting with some new food ideas for the menu when the shutdown is over and this smoked brisket was delicious. When this thing is over and we can all get out again, wander on over to Skyway and load up on their good ‘Que and be ready to support their outstanding staff. The crew is professional, friendly, and want to make sure your experience has been a good one. Where was I going with this? Oh, yeah, so thank you Tracie for taking care of dinner for us. The brisket was much better than the chicken feet I was going to do. The menu ended up being beef brisket with bbq sauce, baked potato done in the air fryer and steamed asparagus, preceded by two Manhattans and accompanied by a bottle of cabernet sauvignon.

Read yesterday that by the time this is over we’ll probably all be wearing masks when we are out in public. The missus comes up to me this morning and asks, “do you think I should be making us some masks?” I responded that it would probably be a good idea. So’s, she searched the world wide web and found some different ideas. There are instructions from very professional type masks, to using t-shirts, bandanas, towels, bras, etc. The one I nixed for myself, though, was using my old underwear. She’ll be taking orders for y’all, just specify tidy whiteys or boxers.

Well, it’s 1:29 pm and you know what that means don’t ya. The stock market closed in New York 29 minutes ago. I hate to leave y’all, but I will need to wrap up this rambling and switch over to my financial web sites to see how much I lost today.

Oh, aren’t you proud of me. I have not said one thing about the incompetent “stable genius” leading us through this mess. I am comforted to find out that his son-in-law is going to save us from the corona virus. For a good read, check out the opinion piece in the NY Times this morning by Michelle Goldberg. Quoting her, “Kushner has succeeded at exactly three things in his life. He was born to the right parents, married well and learned how to influence his father-in-law. Most of his other endeavors — his biggest real estate deal, his foray into newspaper ownership, his attempt to broker a peace deal between the Israelis and the Palestinians — have been failures.” And, from the mouth of “stable genius Junior”, “The notion of the federal stockpile is that it’s supposed to be our stockpile. It’s not supposed to be states’ stockpiles that they then use.” (Jared Kusshner, April 2, 2020)

Now I really am going to sign off. Have a great day!! Ziggyman

Hope you’re having a nice day sitting at home again. I think it’s Thursday. I bet you’ve had to stop and think recently, now what day is it? Better get used to it. This is just day 11 of the official Oregon “Stay at Home Order” and I can see this going to at least the end of May if the new cases reported don’t start dropping. I just saw the report from the Oregon Health Authority showing 90 new cases yesterday and 2 more deaths. Now let me see, on January 8th the CDC issued an official health advisory about COVID-19. On January 10th Former Trump Homeland Security Advisor Tom Bossert warned that we shouldn’t “jerk around with ego politics” because “we face a global health threat…Coordinate!” Throughout the rest of the month of January advisers and medical experts were telling tRump and his staff that this needed to be taken seriously and gave detailed recommendations. On January 28th the administration was warned to prepare hospitals for more masks and gowns and to prepare for isolation. For most of the month of February warnings were given about the seriousness of this virus, but not much was done, unless you are a member of the cult and you believe that our great leader was working on this tirelessly. They listen to their Faux News station and believe that this is just a Democratic hoax. On March 3rd, the VP, Very Pathetic Mike Penis was asked about legislation encouraging companies to produce more masks. His response: the Trump administration is looking at it. On March 4th, Health and Human Services report that they only have 1 percent of respirator masks needed if the virus becomes a full-blown pandemic. On March 16th, tRump announced his support for a 15-day period of social distancing in order to slow the spread of coronavirus. Remember now, this follows his earlier statements that this “China Virus” was just the flu. If I count correctly, from the time the CDC made their warning on January 8th until tRump shows a little concern on March 16th, 10 weeks have gone by. At this point, the administration begins recognizing that perhaps they have f—–d up. There is a huge shortage of Personal Protective Equipment, States are beginning to shut down, deaths from COVID-19 are rising each day, people cannot get testing for the virus, the administration looks like a bunch of bumbling fools in their daily press briefings (with the exception of Dr. Fauci), the economy is in deep s–t, the unemployment rate is at depression era percentages, and the Repubs are beginning to strategize damage control with alternate reality bull s–t. Today is April 2nd and the nation is paralyzed. I have seen some posts on Facebook extolling the great leadership that tRump has provided and I just want to barf. I understand leadership, and what we have experienced is textbook exact opposite of effective leadership. This is the “stable genius” who dismantled the CDC Pandemic Task Force because they just sit around and never have to do anything. Smooth move Donny.

Okay, I have to go turn on the news now to hear some positive happenings in this world. Hang in there, comrades. Ziggyman

OMG, now I see that Dr. Fauci has to have security because he is facing growing threats to his safety. I’m sure this is because he has the cojone’s (balls) to tell tRump he is full of shit with some of his misstatements and bull shit. Dr. Fauci has become a target from some of the asshat’s base and have questioned his expertise because they want tRump to ease the restrictions to get the economy moving. I want to see the economy get going again also, but not at the expense of human lives. The economy will get going once we get over the apex and start a downward trend of cases and deaths. I think that VP (Very Pathetic) Mike Penis is starting to get it. I see he has told the church folks that it might be a good idea to refrain from their Hallelujah’s for a little while. I’m sure he is still pissed about the Pillow Guy getting to kiss tRump’s ass more than him at that briefing the other day.

Anyhoo, had a delicious dinner tonight. If you haven’t thought about an Air Fryer, think about it. The missus gave me one for Christmas and I LOVE IT! You can do so many things in it and it is so much healthier than oil fried meats. We had a quasi Cobb salad. Chicken tenders soaked in buttermilk, then slapped in some panko with cayenne pepper and air fried. Salad greens, steamed asparagus on top, diced celery, tomato, diced brie, kalamota olives, sliced hard boiled egg (I think that was everything), topped with blue cheese dressing. The last of the yeasted corn bread toasted and a nice dry Riesling.

Well, I think I am going to sign off and go watch a movie or something and try to get to bed a little earlier tonight. I need to get my beauty sleep and last night was a little too short. I do want to leave you with one little thought, however, as we approach Easter I want to leave you with this

oh well, how about one more

The Ziggyman, wishes you all a safe and healthy, sleepful evening.

Okay peoples, WTF!!! Today is April 1st, 14 days into spring and this is what I wake up to after a short night due to my early morning posting to this blog. 33 degrees and snowing like hell. This is NOT an April Fool’s joke. Anyhoo, how about some good news. John Prine’s wife has reported that he is now in stable condition after being put on a ventilator. He had been hospitalized in critical condition with the Corona Virus and she also had been tested positive with the virus, but is now fully recovered. Scary stuff, especially when he and I are the same age. Hey wife, please be sure to keep washing your hands because this stuff Ain’t No Spanish Pipe Dream, It’s a Big Old Goofy World, and I Ain’t Hurtin’ No One. I know I’m Crazy as a Loon and don’t want to have to spend Christmas in Prison just because I had an Illegal Smile, but When I Get to Heaven I hope to meet up with Sam Stone and you know My Grandpa Was a Carpenter. For now I just want to Fish and Whistle and write about Some Human’s Ain’t Human (y’all know who I’m talking about here)

The missus and I were gifted with some pastrami yesterday from our good friends at Skyway Bar and Grill and made us some delicious hot pastrami sandwiches on rye with sweet, hot mustard and swiss cheese for dinner. Hot damn!! We need to get through this quickly so’s we can get up to our favorite hangout and begin commiserating with our comrades again. There were some small pieces leftover, so for breakfast I made pastrami hash and toasted up some of that yeasted corn bread from the other day.

Hey, several days ago I was wondering where the “Mayor” had been. Hadn’t seen bucktooth for awhile and thought that perhaps he had been taken out by the Mafia, CIA, or his ex-wife. I guess they put his photo on a milk carton and he has shown up.

We know he has resurfaced because he had his Twitter account locked and a tweet he made with misinformation deleted by Twitter a couple of days ago. I thought he did a pretty good job handling the 911 aftermath as Mayor of NY, but something has sure affected his brain since then. Business Insider reported this on March 29th. https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-twitter-deletes-giuliani-tweet-for-spreading-misinformation-2020-3?fbclid=IwAR3Hv6OlcLAzlLXPuoHvQPt3MMHcDRMsQtZPrGLt54Ghpv4B9w_WN6H7q4w

Well, it quit snowing and the missus said we need to get out of the house and get some fresh air. So we did a nice 2+ mile walk and now feel much better. Where we live we get some nice scenery while out walking and it was nice little break from thinking up some of this schtuff.

Okay, enough of sitting at this computer for awhile. I think I will go read about today’s events and I’m sure pick up some more things to ramble about. If I get too bored tonight I may post a Part III. Happy April Fool’s Day and wash your hands frequently. Ziggyman

Okay, it is 12:48 a.m. on April 1 and I am still wired. I worked on getting this blog setup for 4 hours, with numerous difficulties (probably due to my age and brain cell depletion). But after 3 live chats with the people from WordPress, we up and runnin’ baby. I made my first post a couple of hours ago and verified it is now working. So, what do we want to chat about at this hour of the evening (or I guess technically, morning). The missus is sound asleep, but I’m rarin’ to go. I have finished the last drop of wine from the bottle, but still feel a need to connect with my comrades. In a few hours I will be getting out of bed, pulling out the scale from under the bathroom sink to make sure I am still either keeping my fighting weight or going into the “losing weight cancer symptom” (so far, I’m still at my fighting weight), putting on my new favorite pants that I wear everyday now (green Dickies), brushing the few hair strands I have into a cool look, and then go down the stairs to prepare for the “same shit, different day” in the new Stay at Home Order. I will venture to guess that your routine is not a whole lot different.

I started thinking about reestablishing this blog, that I had started in 2011, after sitting in my favorite chair and reading some poetry from Jim Harrison’s In Search of Small Gods. I thought to myself, boy do we need some God right now. As you may be aware, there is an individual who thinks he is leading our nation right now as our savior “To Make America Great Again” and has been compared to Jesus Christ by his base and political lemmings. Here’s what I think —

Anyway, it is now about 1:30 am and that wine is finally making me a little sleepy. I guess I will have to leave all you sleepyheads and resume our chatter tomorrow. I hope when you get up in the morning you will be healthy and continue to follow the President’s Guidelines for leading us through this mess that was brought about by President Obama. Ziggyman says Keep Smilin’.

Well, I think I’m getting this blog setup to publish some of my ramblings and connect with y’all while we are sitting in our forts, probably drinking more than usual, and I’m not talking kool-aid. The missus and I did venture down to Sandy to get us some vittles today. It was really eerie driving off of the mountain and seeing very few cars coming up and going down except for, in typical fashion, some 4 wheel drive pickup asshole with Washington plates going by us at approximately 80 MPH based on my calculations. Anyhooo, once in “town” we proceeded to enter Safeway whereupon we went through our routines by first grabbing a handy wipe and sanitizing the handle on the cart and then making sure that no one was in six feet of us. When that poor 80 year old woman hobbled by us and the missus yelled at her to keep her social distance, I just cringed — JUST KIDDING, DEAR ( I made that up). Thank God they had some flour, because we haven’t seen any in stores for two weeks. Toilet paper still absentia. I’m going to check with tRump Enterprises and see when that tRump TP (“Excellent, Fantastic, Awesome for your rump wipe”) will be available. Hopefully, Amazon will be carrying it. Back to the flour, y’all know we are 70 somethings on fixed income, so until that check with Donny’s signature comes, we’ll have to be baking bread everyday, and being able to get flour was the highlight of our day.

So, yesterday I sent a little teaser to my friends about my upcoming blog and mentioned that I was cooking some Rancho Gordo beans and cornbread for our evening dining experience. Oh my god, can I say orgasmic. Domingo Rojos heirloom beans with a few aromatics and some other stuff I added (trade secret) and a yeasted corn bread. Bring on COVID-19, we’re eating some good shit every night. This was accompanied by a very nice Stave and Stone Merlot, recently gathered at the winery. Here you go, start salivating my comrades.

Now to the good stuff. Did you see that f…ing pillow guy at the “Daily Coronvirus (China Virus) Briefing” (political campaign TV rally)? What a tool.

Do y’all think Very Pathetic Mike Penis is a little annoyed at this guy having the stage to kiss tRumps ass more than he was able to? I also heard today that Donny now is saying that 240,000 Americans could die before this over and it’s going to be a “very, very painful two weeks”. Wait a minute, I thought he and his lemmings told us in February it was just a little flu and just like that it will be all gone. Oh well, what does that Dr. Fauci know anyway.

Well, I need to go pour myself another glass of wine and think about what I will do tomorrow. Oh, I know, same shit, different day. With that, my comrades, have a sweet dreamful evening and stay healthy. Ziggyman, over and out.