The WAY to WOW Shows
Cocktails & Conduct that Exemplifies a Man
August 15, 2024
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[0:03] hello good afternoon and welcome to jigger's place I'm your host Kevin bamel and we are here every other Thursday at 5:00 pm Pacific time to have a cocktail relax as we get head toward the end of the week and talk about what I what I call all of the things that are are worth that make life worthwhile um everything uh excluding Business and Professional issues which I talk about on my shows the other three days of the week and so today I'm going to be

[0:41] talking about a subject that certainly when I was growing up was not the least bit controversial um but but it certainly has become so in the Contemporary world and that is the the conduct that exemplifies a man and and as as a cocktail to go with that I've chosen a a Jin CL classic Jin Martini now you may be thinking well wait a minute uh martinis isn't that the the James Bond

[1:16] cocktail and and indeed um you know James Bond is is famous for the you know Martini uh you know shaken not stirred that whole sort of thing but the James Bond Martini is actually a vodka martini and it's not made with vermouth it's made with something called lilet blon which uh is is to the best of my research is not Kosher so um I couldn't make a a James Bond type martini and in any event um martinis particularly JY

[1:51] martinis are one of my favorite cocktails and so and and it's it's something honestly that I'm I'm known for and so that's what we're going to have today uh I'm going to be using one of my favorite Gins and and this is not just because it's my favorite but in honor of the Olympic Games that just uh recently concluded in Paris France this is Citadel gin it's a it's a pretty classic uh dry gin in the London dry gin

[2:26] mode um but it is it is it comes from France and um one of the things I like about it is is it has kind of overtones of of citrus in particular lemon um but it but it also has a very sort of classic gin style um Juniper cardamon those kinds of of spices and um in in dis contradistinction to one of my other very favorite gin oper which has a very

[3:01] strong uh Oriental pallet now when I say Oriental in this case I'm talking about the sort of bygone days uh difference between what was called accidental which was was sort of you know Western Europe and that area versus the Orient which was included everything from uh the mid East turkey on in through uh the rest of Asia so but but it had op here is is is a fantastic gin just you know not not the best gin uh to have uh to use for

[3:36] making a martini and um I'm going to be using um extra dry vermouth this happens to be chinan this is an Italian vermouth it's very dry they've been making it in Italy since 1757 so this is kind of the the new new world meets the the old world and and you know a good martini is is just those two ingredients now for those of you who are fans of the TV show MH from the 1970s you may recall the brilliant um

[4:13] Alan Alder line about how he likes his his martinis dry very dry and and and he basically his Martini is jyn while he looks at a picture of Albert somebody or other being the inventor of vermouth um I do like a dry a drer martini not quite as dry as as Hawkeye so I mix my martinis at a ratio of four parts gin to one part vermouth and and I prefer making Jin my Martinis in a mixing glass

[4:50] so so that's what I'm going to do here and and basically I'm going to mix uh 2 oz of [Music] Jin okay and in the ratio of 4: one that means that I'm going to put in a half

[5:27] oun of move by the way um you know you can see that only part of this bottle is used I I do keep my vermouth refrigerated it lasts longer that way um you know Jin and whiskey and those kind of things I don't I don't keep refrigerated okay and then add ice of course um to

[6:05] [Music] it now one of the key things about mixing cocktails is they really when once you put the ice in and I'm using a bar spoon I'm just going to mix this it's not you don't want to just sort of give it a quick mix and that's it you really want to you want to um ice it down um for those of you who watched last week when I was doing a cocktail and a Shaker by the

[6:41] time I was done you can see the whole outside of the Shaker was froed in this case it's somewhat the same thing the um the outside of the mixing glass should be frosted so a good you know 15 20 seconds and you might be thinking well but isn't that going to water down the the martini and the and the reality is yes it is going to water it down a little bit but water opens up most um most spirits and um and so that's a that's a good way to to do them and in

[7:17] this case the martini comes out just beautifully nice and clear you can see that there you go you can see it's kind of Frosty in the glass that's a good Jin Martini so uh just hang tight here I'll see

[7:52] you so here we are in in in my living room and uh jiggers his place is essentially my bar right behind me and um as I said the topic for this afternoon's show is conduct that exemplifies a man so I tell you a little story from from my uh teenhood I guess it's called um I was uh 16 years old I had just gotten my uh driver's license and so you know was excited to drive

[8:28] anywhere and and um and and my mother started uh taking advantage of that I don't I don't literally mean taking advantage like you know taking advantage of me but you know she would she if she wanted to go somewhere she would ask me hey do you want to you know drive me to the store or whatever and so here I am you know my newly minted driver's license and uh we get in the car and I drive my mother to the store and I get out of the car and I proceed to walk to the store store and I get maybe you know 5 10 yards from the car and I realize my

[9:04] mother isn't with me I went back to the car on her side and she's sitting quietly in the front passenger seat just quiet as can be and I open the door for her and she says thank you and she gets out of the car and you know we proceed to walk to the store and it was an object lesson for me in what it was from my mother's perspective to be a man or perhaps a gentleman um in in the parlament of the

[9:42] day this would have been 1976 when I turned 16 and when I when we walked into the store uh you know she waited for me to open the door for her and it wasn't that my mother couldn't open her own car door or open the door to the store she certainly could have it was that uh she insisted that I treat her with a certain level of respect and and that's what that was all

[10:19] about so now fast forward about two and a half years later I'm in college and I had invited a a young woman to to go on a date with me and we decided we were going to go see a movie and I had uh I you know I think I borrowed a friend's car because I didn't have a car in my freshman year although maybe it was my sophomore year when I had a car maybe so maybe it's three years later but in any event you know drive the car to the movie theater pull into the parking lot you know get out of the car and come around to open the door

[10:57] for the young woman I was with and she sees me coming to open the door and she quickly opens the door and gets out and she looks at me she says what you don't think I can open the door for myself and I said no I'm I'm I'm sure you can I said I was taught that that the polite thing is for a man to open a door for a woman um it has nothing to do with with ability it has to do with showing her respect and and she gave me a rather contemptuous look now that was a Harbinger for the way the rest of the

[11:33] date went and as as I'm sure you might imagine we didn't go out on another date I I don't I never asked her but I'm pretty sure she would have said no had I asked her and and you know we're talking about the difference between 1976 and 1978 or 79 and and and also a generational difference of course um because you know my mother um is uh 25 years older than I am so yeah a generation different and and and you can

[12:10] see there was a significant change now that's not to say that all the women of my mother's generation looked at men the same way nor that all the women of this young woman's generation looked looked at men the same way that she did suffice it to say though I recognized at at a you know teenage age that women looked at men or what they wanted from men was very very different and over succeeding

[12:45] years it's been an issue of great interest to me what what is what is the conduct that exemplifies a man and you have to excuse me have to have a sip of my Martini so first of all just the title of this show I think tells you a little bit about my perspective what a man looks like I don't think is particularly relevant so

[13:22] to it's it's common today much more common today among younger men for example that they have a beer and Men of my generation far less likely to have a beard unless you're in my community which is a religious Jewish Community where having a beard is a is a you know a an eon's long tradition uh but but in general um men my age um don't don't wear a beard and in fact um another one the my college

[13:57] girlfriend I call her because it was the only real girlfriend I had in college she badly wanted me to grow a beard and I did and the same day that we broke up I shaved off the beard and and mustache and was grateful never have to have to wear a beard or a mustache again um so you know while you see me typically dressed in a suit off or or a tie with a shirt and a vest I dress that because I I want to project a certain

[14:32] image uh just because a man does not dress that way doesn't mean that he is not exemplifying being a man what I find is dressing this way helps reinforce my conduct toward that which I think the toward the way that I think a man should behave and so that's why I dress the way that I do even when I'm not doing a show so if you come by on Friday night on the Sabbath I'll be dressed minimally like this almost always with a tie on uh and

[15:08] I and and that's when I you know spend the Sabbath by myself because for me I I I I'm very comfortable dressing this way so so what is then the conduct that exemplifies a man and I've I've got several ideas about that and I'm G to I'm share those with you first of all a man acts responsibly he takes

[15:43] responsibility for first of all himself his conduct his behavior second of all for the wellbeing of the people around him now if he's married that means his wife and children if he has children he takes responsibility for his dog if he's out walking them if he is part of a family um but he's not married yet he takes responsibility for the well-being of his parents of his sisters of his brothers of his cousins his aunts his

[16:18] uncles in other words there really isn't a boundary to the people for whom a man is resp takes respons responsibility for their well-being now that isn't to say that he impoverishes himself for example giving money so that you know poor people have what to eat and those kind of things I don't mean it in that way what I mean is that for example a man will hold the door open not just for a woman but he

[16:54] will also hold the door open for a man who was older than he is even even given that that man can like like any woman open a door for himself he's expressing respect for that man as being his senior in age it it doesn't matter a bit whether you know the man holding the door is a top professional and the Man For Whom he's holding the door is an older man who appears to be a laborer that is completely immaterial

[17:29] to the conduct of a man a man looks at all men as being worthy of respect until they show themselves to not be worthy of that respect and that's a key quality so a man demonstrates respect for people for for women es especially there's a bit of a of chivalrous conduct there um but for men as well and he also shows

[18:06] respect for children now when I say he shows respect with Children what I mean is he requires that children behave appropriately for their surroundings so I'll give you an example this is going back a number of years ago I was it was a Friday uh sorry a Saturday morning and I was at my synagogue for prayer service and the service uh had just recently ended but as is oftentimes the case there were a few people who didn't

[18:43] finish their prayers with the group and so they were still in the sanctuary finishing their prayers nonetheless some young boys decided that they were going to play a game of Chase each other and tag through the S through the sanctuary and I I was putting away my my what's called a Talis my prayer Shaw and I see these boys running through and I sto them and I said I said stop that right now come with me and I took them out into the lobby and I said to

[19:20] them there are people praying in the sanctuary and that is a sanctuary anyway running and SC screaming and playing tag in the sanctuary is not appropriate and you may not do it now I didn't yell at them I didn't raise my voice I just explained it to them very directly that their behavior was not appropriate one of the boys responded by saying you can't say that to me my father will take care of you and my response to that child was

[19:56] really do you think so let's go talk to your father right now so after a a Jewish service on a Saturday there's something called a kiddish it's basically you have a little snack and and and socialize so I I I I basically took the boy by the arm I didn't you know hurt him but I took him by the arm and I took him out to where the Kish was happening in the back of the synagogue and I said where is your father and now he's looking a little app hensive and uh and so I start walking

[20:33] toward you know where where the people are and a man I can see I can pretty quickly figure out which one his father is because I can see him looking at me with a a look on his face of what's going on here and I walk up to him and I said is this your son and he says yes and I said your son and two of his friends were running through the sanctuary and they were doing it even when people were finishing their prayers and so I told them to stop that

[21:11] and I asked them to come out into the lobby and I explained to them that their behavior was inappropriate and they could not do that and your son said to me in response that you wouldn't like my saying this to him and so I came out to speak to you about that and find out if indeed you you want your son running through the sanctuary and disturbing people who are praying right poor guy so the father said uh uh no I don't want my son doing

[21:50] that I said okay well well good here's your son and you know good shabas good Sabbath right I left that was it so to my mind that was being respectful to that child it's in my from my perspective and I I realize there are parents out there who who do believe that corporal punishment is appropriate I'm not going to argue that point here right now but explaining to a

[22:26] child appropriate conduct even though I'm not his parent is showing respect for that child because I especially a male child because I'm helping him understand the appropriate conduct for him as he grows up and eventually becomes a man I didn't and and now I don't believe in yelling at children I think that's wrong but I do believe in talking to Children directly and I do believe that that is is a respectful way to treat a

[23:01] child who is misbehaving to allow a child to continue misbehaving is not respectful and it is not kind right so a man treats everyone with respect until they demonstrate that they are not worthy of being respected and then at that point a man will treat human beings with decency but that doesn't mean that he respects them and that's the difference between the two this is a lesson I

[23:36] learned from a friend of mine because I used to say well everybody deserves to be treated with respect and and we had a conversation about that and actually I don't believe that people who act disrespectfully should be treated with respect now that doesn't mean that they should be mistreated they have to be treated decently but that doesn't mean that I have to respect them and there are many people frankly that I don't respect because their their behavior is frankly despicable and and a Man Too that that's

[24:12] another way a man conducts himself is first of all he doesn't identify disrespectful Behavior as being acceptable he doesn't respect disrespectable Behavior okay that doesn't mean he mistreats people it's just he doesn't again show if if if someone is mistreating someone else that person is not the person doing the mistreating is not uh is is is not

[24:47] entitled to respect and a and a man would not respect that person okay now next is a man acts with Integrity so he holds himself to a moral code and that moral code is frankly shival in its antecedence okay and you might you could go even F farther back than that and say it's it's some it's biblical the shival

[25:24] rck code for the most part was a Biblical code because it it came out of Christianity but these are the some of the things that that I've been talking about so treating people decently that's a matter of Integrity so if I treat someone inappropriately or worse if I mistreat someone that is not a reflection on the person that's a reflection on me as a

[26:00] man a man does not mistreat people because that's acting without integrity and a man seeks to act with Integrity always now this is a good time to mention a man sometimes makes mistakes and sometimes he does not treat people respectfully even though he should and at times he may even miss treat someone even though he shouldn't that goes back to the first

[26:35] aspect of a man the first conduct of a man which is he acts responsibly so the difference between a man and a boy is if a boy treats some mistreats someone the boy probably has to be told to apologize and to amend his behavior a man doesn't have to be told to do that so one of my absolute favorite stories about one of my

[27:11] favorite uh individuals from history is when George Patton after he graduated from the military academy he was in his first Billet he was a newly minted Army second lieutenant and he was put in charge of making sure the Stables where the horses were kept were kept in proper order this is back when the Cavalry still uh you know had horses I mean the Cavalry yeah was still a horse bound as opposed to what we think of Cavalry today which is more of tanks and that sort of thing and he showed up one

[27:48] morning to inspect the stables and found that they were in terrible condition and he approached one of his soldiers and the soldier I guess was kind of you know just kind of walking around slowly and not really doing anything and patton said to this Soldier something along lines of get to work like now and he said excuse my French damn you and of course the soldier heard that

[28:23] and he immediately HED to it and got to work as did all the the other soldiers that were detailed to clean the stables and patton turned around and he left and he went back to his office and he started thinking about what he had said to that Soldier and he realized that he had made a grave error and so later that day he went back to the Stables to inspect them and indeed they passed muster now and and he called all the soldiers

[29:00] together into a group and the man that he had spoken to earlier was in the in the front of the group and he said to all the soldiers there he said earlier this morning I yelled at this man and I said damn you said well it's perfectly okay for me to yell at a soldier if he's not pursuing his duty with alacrity it is absolutely wrong for me to say damn you to a

[29:40] soldier and he turned to the man and he said I apologize for saying that to you I was wrong to do that in front of all of his men now for those of you who've seen the ayous movie Paton you may say that's not how Patton acted but indeed that is how Patton acted because his father and his aunt instilled in him the conduct that a man demonstrated and a man takes responsibility for when he has not acted

[30:17] with Integrity he doesn't have to be told he figures it out and then minimally he apologizes and he does his best to fix it so Patton couldn't take back his words but to the best that the record shows and I've studyed Patton's career very deeply he never said you know damn you to another P another Soldier again um probably said it about the Enemy by the way which uh I I think is

[30:54] okay next a man exhibits courage for those of you who have ever received an email from me or have heard me sign off my show I sign off with courage at all times now this is my way of giving you what's called in Hebrew K strength because courage is what is what helps us take our strength and stay true to our values and and a man stays he's not just

[31:31] physically courageous because to be physically courageous at all times could easily turn into something that's fool hearty if a man is pointing a gun at me and telling me to do something trying to physically overpower that man is stupid and having been held up at gunpoint where the gun was literally right here it would have been very foolish for me to challenge that young man who was who was attempting to

[32:06] rob me I needed mental courage at that moment because it just so happened all I had on me was my pager which tells you how long ago this was and my keys to my my apartment I had run out to take care of an emergency at another building that I managed and that's all I had and this this young man holding me up wanted money and I I I had to convince him that I did not have any money without getting shot and I can tell you

[32:43] the the the gun he was holding on me was a 22 caliber Ruger target pistol and if he had shot me at that close range he probably would have killed me so the courage I needed at that moment was the courage of restraint right sometimes the courage we need is the courage to stand up and and really adhere to what we believe in sometimes the courage we need is the courage to stand up to other people who are mistreating someone and say you are

[33:21] mistreating this person stop it that's the kind of courage that exemplifies the conduct of a true man he won't stand by while other people are being abused or mistreated but he won't act foolishly just to show that he has courage so that's when I when I sign off courage at all times that's the kind of Courage I'm hoping will bless you next

[33:58] a a a man is humble he doesn't need to brag about his accomplishments to show off how big a man he is in fact one of the best ways to tell that a man that a that a a male is not a man is because he regales you with stories of his manhood now you might say well isn't that what you're doing right now you could you could certainly say that I'm I'm using some

[34:33] examples from my life in order to make the picture more Vivid uh but if if if we spend time together uh I I think you would find that I will not regail you with Tales of my manhood because first of all I think that's obnoxious and second of all a man doesn't do that a man is humble he's humble about his accomplishments he's humble about his behavior he's humble about

[35:08] his attitude toward other people he doesn't need other people to believe that he's Superior that is irrelevant how people size him up against others makes no difference at all what matters is that he stays true to his values and he conducts himself according to those behaviors and values that exemplify a

[35:45] man right so one way that you can tell someone is truly a man is other people identify him as such but it's just like when someone tells you I'm an honest person that's when you got to hold on to your wallet right if they have to tell you they're honest they're they may not be honest if someone has to tell you he's a man he there's a strong likelihood he's not a man okay a boy tells you that he's

[36:23] a man a man stays silent on that subject next a man is committed this goes with courage and many of the other uh behaviors that we've talked about so he's not easily swayed off of his goal he has perseverance especially when it really matter

[36:59] matters so sometimes life is grindingly hard and taking care of a wife and children just saps a man's strength a man would never abandon his wife and children never no matter how tough it was because he's committed to them he's committed to his family he may get tired he may get

[37:37] frustrated he may need to take a vacation but but he's committed and he will not break that commitment and why because a man is self-disciplined and he acts with self-discipline he this again going back to the difference between a boy and a man when you have a male human being if his behavior in if in order for his behavior

[38:14] to be appropriate it requires outside restraint he's not a man yet now let me be quick to note even the best of men sometimes lose control and they require other men or maybe even their wife to help restrain them either physically or in the case of a wife it's probably more emotionally okay but in the main a man

[38:50] is self disciplined and a boy is in the main not and a teenage male probably somewhere between the two he's working toward the self-discipline of a man but he's not really there yet and so sometimes he does act in an undisciplined unself disciplined way and that's okay because he's a teenager he's still maturing in fact until um until a male is is into his mid to late 20s he probably hasn't fully developed

[39:25] as a man yet and so one could expect that at times he will act in an unself disciplined way the growth of a man comes from acting ever more self-disciplined as he gets older he's maturing as a man and and last and certainly not least a man is loyal he's he's loyal to his wife he's

[40:00] loyal to his children he's loyal to his friends to his community to his country right and you see this by the way I I was I was studying this this morning because in What's called the weekly sedra it's the part of the Torah that's read each week in the synagogue on Saturday we is is uh from Deuteronomy the portion where the Ten Commandments are repeated and the second of the five the

[40:37] second F the second five of The Ten Commandments deal with relationships between people and they include things like don't murder don't steal which actually means really don't kidnap uh and don't covet what another man has a man a true man would never CET what another man has rather he would support him in what he has even if that

[41:13] man is faltering sometimes and not doing his best in taking care of his wife his children Etc a boy on the other and he will covet all the time so if you have a 60-year-old male or a 55y old male who's Covetous he is not a man he can be that old he can have a full grown

[41:48] beard he can be making a lot of money and have had a lot of professional success but he's not a man because he has been disloyal to his community a man can be 60 years old if he cheats on his wife he's not a man because he's been disloyal to his wife so these are the this is the

[42:25] conduct of a that exemplifies a man from from my perspective okay so I'm just going to go over them real quickly again he's responsible he acts with Integrity he um he is courageous he's strong he's humble he's committed he's self-disciplined and he's loyal now for those of you who are familiar with the the Boy Scout Law a scout is trustworthy

[43:00] loyal helpful friendly courteous kind obedient cheerful Thrifty Brave clean and reverent you'll notice that many of the con much of the conduct that I've just described is reflected in the Scout Law that the Scout Law and and I'm not going to get into the the the Contemporary version of of the Boy Scouts but but the Boy Scouts as they were historically constructed going back now a hundred

[43:36] years the point of the Boy Scouts was to help boys become men and you see that reflected in the Scout Law so if if you want to if you want a a a great code to to refer to that that helps explain the conduct of a man go take a look at the Scout Law The Voice Scout Law and and that will help you so here's a toast to you thank you so much for joining me have my last sip

[44:12] of my [Music] Martini before I go I have to show you this this is a uh coaster that I got when I was stationed in Norfolk Virginia this is a picture of the hotel Cavalier in Virginia Beach it was originally built in 1927 and renovated in 1990 oh no 2018 it's an absolutely fabulous hotel if you are planning a trip to Virginia Beach I cannot uh I cannot endorse this hotel

[44:50] highly enough I have no interest in a hotel I don't I don't own shares of stock in it or anything like like that what I can tell you is it is beautiful the the service there is fantastic um I assume that The Distillery that that was there when I visited uh in in 2018 is still there so you can go to a tarnish truth I think it's called Distillery and have a tour and have a couple of tipples it's a beautiful beautiful place um in the bar

[45:25] they have they had a jazz uh uh Trio I think it was when I was there fantastic music beautiful gardens sweeping lawn in front just it gives you a a sense of the the grace of of of the south at its very very best so wanted to share that with you before we sign off so thank you again so much for joining me I I I really appreciate you taking a few minutes here toward the end of your week to relax with me and and let me share some thoughts with you as always I'm I'm

[46:01] interested to hear what you think links to my social media will be in the show notes after this episode posts on YouTube and would would love to hear your thoughts positive or negative um you know it's always nice you know it's negative comments give me food for thought and I appreciate those at least if as much if not more than positive comments so this is our show this is our last show for this week next week on Monday at 10:00 a.m. is my show trust

[46:36] and Estates weekly Tuesday at 10: am these are all Pacific Time by the way is business lessons from the military and Wednesday at 10: a. is the next edition of people making money so I wish you a wonderful evening a wonderful rest of the week and restorative weekend and I sign off as I always do Marie darling my my my Southern bell you are my bell courage