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Today marks the 236th birthday of the United States Coast Guard.<\/p>\n
On August 4, 1790, Alexander Hamilton’s vision became reality when President George Washington signed the Tariff Act authorizing ten revenue cutters to protect the young Republic, enforce the tariff laws, and guard America’s coastlines. One cutter was assigned to each major port, built by American craftsmen and manned by American sailors.<\/p>\n
The old photograph is from 1972. The Coast Guard cap belonged to my roommate JT, who was standing the watch in that remarkable service. The tune below is The Sailor’s Hornpipe, offered as a small salute to everyone who has ever had the watch.<\/p>\n
There has still been no resumption of bombing in the Persian conflict, so Miles allowed the Conference Room to enjoy a comparatively relaxed breakfast.<\/p>\n
Given the cautious optimism that common sense may have broken out for at least another morning, I decided to keep things simple. It looked as though only the four hardy souls who stood the overnight watch and the seven who insist breakfast is an essential part of the Production Meeting would be around the table.<\/p>\n
Not exactly a crowd.<\/p>\n
When that happens, I like having something I can put together almost before the coffee is finished brewing. I actually timed this one once to see how quickly a respectable breakfast could appear with little or no warning.<\/p>\n
The checklist is simple.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/080426-2.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Open the refrigerator and make sure there is still a fresh dozen eggs from the DePaul Urban Farm over in Centreville.<\/p>\n
Find the package of shredded cheese.<\/p>\n
Locate the sliced ham The Boys picked up from the Organic Butcher in McLean, whose pork comes from our friends at Autumn Olive Farms in the Shenandoah Valley.<\/p>\n
Spray the muffin pan, press the ham into each cup, crack in an egg, add cheese, season with pepper and Sloppy Mama’s, and slide the pan into a 375-degree oven.<\/p>\n
Twelve minutes gives you a soft yolk.<\/p>\n
Fifteen gives you something closer to hard-boiled.<\/p>\n
Either way, breakfast is served.<\/p>\n
It only took me about seven minutes of actual work. The oven did the rest while I deputized the interns to wash the muffin pan afterward and refill the spice rack with Cholula and the Sloppy Mama’s containers.<\/p>\n
That seemed like a fair division of labor.<\/p>\n
Then, in one of those astonishing developments that occur with remarkable regularity around here, breakfast somehow became lunchtime.<\/p>\n
Splash volunteered to run downstairs to Whole Foods for a package of those excellent Nature’s Own brioche rolls that happened to be on sale.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/080426-3.jpg\")
\nOne ham-and-egg cup drops neatly into a sliced brioche roll.<\/p>\n
Instant lunch.<\/p>\n
That also takes some of the pressure off figuring out dinner. We’ve already worked our way through chicken and pork this week, so perhaps it’s time to spin the arrow on the menu wheel and see what fate has planned.<\/p>\n
Who knows?<\/p>\n
Maybe by supper the Strait will actually be open.<\/p>\n
Copyright \u00a9 2026 Vic Socotra<\/p>\n
www.vicsocotra.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Today marks the 236th birthday of the United States Coast Guard. On August 4, 1790, Alexander Hamilton’s vision became reality when President George Washington signed the Tariff Act authorizing ten revenue cutters to protect the young Republic, enforce the tariff laws, and guard America’s coastlines. One cutter was assigned to each major port, built by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33847","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-daily-socotra"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33847","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33847"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33847\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33853,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33847\/revisions\/33853"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33847"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33847"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vicsocotra.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33847"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}