Let me paraphrase Longfellow:

“Listen, my children, and you shall hear

Not the midnight ride of Paul Revere,

But what we saw in ’73,

Not knowing it would turn out to be

A taste of future history.”

What I am talking about is what we watched in 1973 when Woody Allen’s film “Sleeper” came out, and we learned what happened when a scientist played by Woody Allen is awakened after a 200 year cyrogenic sleep. I found this dialogue on a random web site; I am assuming it is accurate.

“Dr. Melik: This morning for breakfast he requested something called “wheat germ, organic honey, and tiger’s milk.”

“Dr. Aragon: Oh, yes. Those are the charmed substances that some years ago were thought to contain life-preserving properties.

“Dr. Melik: You mean there was no deep fat? No steak or cream pies or…..hot fudge?

“Dr. Aragon: Those were thought to be unhealthy…precisely the opposite of what we now know to be true.

“Dr. Melik: Incredible.”

While we were laughing, one audience member may not have been. Nineteen year old Robert Kennedy, Jr. undoubtedly saw this film, and just as undoubtedly, it must have given him an idea and a mission in life. And 53 years later, now that he is the Secretary of Health and Human Services, he is able to put Woody Allen’s parody (which he undoubtedly never knew was parody, but took to be gospel) into action.

Yesterday, Robert F. Kennedy told Americans to eat more red meat and more cheese.

You can’t make this stuff up. Unless you are Woody Allen.

Or Cole Porter:

“The world has gone mad today, and good’s bad today, and black’s white today, and day’s night today….”

Today, this is not major news. Health care is not major news. Even Venezuela is not major news (unless you are in Venezuela). Today’s major news is Minneapolis, where snow, but not ICE, is welcome this winter, where a 37 year old resident was shot by an ICE agent in her car, where ICE is having their largest operation yet because Trump doesn’t want Somalis in his country.

There is so much going on, but I seem to be in a poetic mood. That’s because I wound up last night with a sore throat which kept me up most of the night and is still with me. This is my first blog post written under the weather and I will make it short and quote something that Ogden Nash, the greatest poet of all times, did not write:

“Do I think I might have the flu?

I do.”