6/26/2026

 Friday, June 26, 2026

1968 Iwo Jima was returned to Japan by the US

2003 The Supreme Court ruled in Lawrence v. Texas that gender-based sodomy laws are unconstitutional.

2015 The Supreme Court ruled 5-4 same-sex marriage is a legal right across all US stat

2015 US President Barack Obama sang "Amazing Grace" as part of his eulogy for the 9 victims at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston

2025 Three Palestinians were killed and many others were injured by Israeli settlers in the village of Kafr Malik near Ramallah in the West Bank.

In bed at 9, up at 5:20; 0540 144/77/56 117 204.2, 0555 135/72/55; 56/67/53, partly sunny day ahead.   

Morning meds at 9:35 a.m., and Eliquis at 7 a.m. and p.m. Trulicity injection at 12:30 p.m.

Lonesome Dove.  I had not expected this novel to contain as much humor as it does, but I am really enjoying it.  Early this morning, I read chapter 37, which relates the story of Fort Smith's Deputy Sheriff Roscoe Brown's encounter with Farmer Louisa Brooks and her transactional attitude towards the institution of marriage on the frontier.  I can't help smiling and chuckling while reading it.  I picture Marjorie Main as Ma Kettle as Louisa, and Percy Kilbride as Pa Kettle as Roscoe. . . I'm learning why this saga is 862 pages long: it has many stories going on at the same time, Call & Gus heading to Montana, Jake Spoon & Lorena Wood heading to San Francisco, July Johnson searching for the fugitive Jake Spoon and then his runaway wife Elmira, Roscoe Brown searching for July Johnson, Elmira Boot Johnson searching for Dee Boot, and I'm only 1/3rd into the story.  And then there are the stories of the minor characters!

I couldn't help wondering whether, when Larry McMurtry came up with the name "Louisa Brooks" for Roscoe Brown''s lusty farm lady, he had in mind the beautiful, erotic, and notorious  Hollywood actress, flapper girl, and later call girl Louise Brooks, star of G.W. Pabst's Pandora's Box.

Another reason I'm enjoying this novel is the light it sheds on the harshness of life in the Old West, especially for cowboys and doubly especially for cowboys on a cattle drive.  I've made several drives out West, first in moving from Brunswick, GA to Yuma, AZ, to report to my first PCS, later to drive my Dad twice from Milwaukee to Phoenix, and twice with my daughter on camping vacations to American and Canadian national parks.  I've always been struck by the great distances to be covered, the great breadth of the continent and the nation.  And, as I cruised along in comfort at 70 or 80 miles per hour, I always contemplated what life must have been like for explorers, pioneers, settlers, early trappers and hunters, and soldiers.  I had some sense of it from my readings, but Lonesome Dove makes the hardships, discomforts, and dangers almost tangible, and also the widespread early lawlessness.  I enjoyed ch. 46 today, about the relationship between Call and Maggie.  Quite a character analysis.  The novel is very much plot-driven, but it's also loaded with character studies.