5/1/2026

Friday, May 1, 2026

1943 Food rationing began in the United States during World War II

1961 Fidel Castro announced there would be no more elections in Cuba

2003 In what became known as the "Mission Accomplished" speech, U.S. President George W. Bush declared that "major combat operations in Iraq have ended" on board the USS Abraham Lincoln off the coast of California

2011 Pope John Paul II was beatified by his successor, Pope Benedict XVI

2020 Armed protesters against stay-at-home-orders gathered at the State Capitol in Lansing, Michigan, as Governor Gretchen Whitmer reinstated the State of Emergency

2025 District Court Judge ruled that US Trump cannot use the Alien Enemies Act to deport Venezuelan migrants, deeming the previous use of this power as having been improperly invoked. 

In bed at 9:30, up at 4:30; 125/61/E, 3 mnutes later 139/74/30 129 204.8; 3643/36, cloudy all day. 

Morning meds at 7 a.m., and half-dose of Bisoprolol at 5:30 a.m.

I woke up with a bad back.  I hoped that a hot shower might alleviate the pain, but no luck, so I put a 5% Lidocaine patch on it.  It kept me from attending the memorial service for our next-door neighbor, John McGregor, at Fox Point Lutheran Church with Geri, but thankfully, it was lifestreamed from the church.  This was the same church in which I attended the funeral for Brad Carr in 1996.  Brad died of cancer at age 50.  I had first met him when Anne and I lived in Juneau Village, during my first two years of law school.  I met him at a party in the apartment of Ron Warren, a law school classmate of mine for one years.  Ron was a physical therapist at Mount Sinai Hospital and worked full time during law school, which probably contributed mightily to his flunking out after our first year.  In any event, Brad Carr was a guest at the party and we met.  I can't remember our next meeting, or when we became friends of a sort, but we did.  I think Brad was teaching and an assistant basketball coach at a Milwaukee high school when I first met him, but he was a born politician and he soon became an aide to Milwaukee's long-term mayor Henry Maier, and the part-time, weekend sportscaster for WISN-TV, Channel 12.  Eventually he became a part-time law student, and eventually a lawyer doing a lot of municipal business which, alas, got him in some bribery trouble which cost him his law license in 1991.  Less than 5 years later, he died at age 50.  I suppose it's hyperbolic, but I think of him as a bit like Icarus, one with tremendous potential but who flew too close to the sun.  He was young, Black, handsome, intelligent, articulate, good-looking, a great tv screen presence, politically well-connected, a lawyer, but too hungry.  My good neighbor John McGregor wasn't the opposite of Brad, but very different.  He was born into the Stratton family, of Briggs and Stratton.  The family changed its name to McGregor from Schlesinger during one of the world wars, because of widespread anti-German animus.  He grew up wealthy, attending Milwaukee Country Day School, and Stanford University, but only after he recovered from polio that left him with some deformity and pain for the rest of his life.  He devoted his life to his family, and to his work in real estate development, and local charities, including Children's Hospital and the Schlitz Audubon Center.  He was a kind, gentle, and generous guy and a truly great neighbor.  He inspired (and shamed) me with his disciplined daily walks and recumbent bike rides.  We were born within weeks of each other in 1941 and, although we were never close personal or social friends (alas), my life was diminished by his death from leukemia.

I watched the entire memorial service on livestream from Fox Point Lutheran Church on Santa Monica Boulevard.  I enjoyed the eulogies given by a friend and by his son, Skip, and everything they said about John rang true.  I didn't get much out of the religious parts of the service, except for the duo who sang Panis Angelicus, which has been one of my favorite hymns for decades, probably since I was a kid.  The singers, ka baritone and a soprano, were both superb.

Panis angelicus
Fit panis hominum
Dat panis coelicus
Figuris terminum
O res mirabilis
Manducat dominum
Pauper, pauper
Servus et humilis

May the Bread of Angels
Become bread for mankind;
The Bread of Heaven puts
All foreshadowings to an end;
Oh, thing miraculous!
The body of the Lord will nourish
the poor, the poor,
the servile, and the humble.