We had one of the first microwave ovens in our neighborhood, probably around 1972 or so. My father was principal of a junior high school that had bought some for their home ec rooms and he was able to buy one of the original Amana models. There was much promise that the microwave oven would thrust us forward into the Jetsonian future. Flying cars and home robots couldn't be far behind. But that was before we realized that the microwave wouldn't brown meats, that re-heated breads came out the texture of jerky, and that it took almost as long to boil water as it did in the tea kettle on the stove. So today we use it for heating up the quick plate of leftovers, melting chocolate and warming soup. One of the premises of this technology was that you could cook in anything (except the dreaded spark-inducing foil), even plastic. Today when I try to find plastic dishes for those too-frequent microwave meals, all are labeled "Not recommended for use in microwaves". Does the plastic leach into the food? Will it crackle and split under the radiation? And, even more disappointingly, there are no flying cars, no Rosie the robot, and not even any Spacely Sprockets.

July 16th - the heart of the summer. The part of the summer sandwich that is all meat, with juice dripping down your chin. It's that bite that's right from the center of the burger - no bun edges or crust, just the one mouthful that you savor for as long as you can. The sunflowers are blooming under the bird feeder, the side effects of the seeds that have been scattered by the squirrels and the doves and the cardinals. The butterfly bush is ripe with deep purple flowers that do indeed attract butterflies of all kinds. The blood red lilies are still strong and sway in the breezes. And I sit in a chair in the shade in the backyard, watching the clouds and listening to the waterfall, and wishing it was always the middle of a warm July day.

Movies: Spartan. David Mamet's movies hold many spots on my list of favorites, and this one will be added to that list. His dialogue is so precise, and he elicits a certain enunciation and timing from his actors that you can always tell his films from just watching a few lines in a single scene. Val Kilmer is a tightly wound, inwardly focused man of action, not of planning, as he admits. He is drawn into a complex framework of deception and political arrogance, and is driven to become both the planner and the executor to ensure that the deceit is exposed. I found myself not breathing during some of the scenes, and replaying many to hear the nuance of language and intonation that Kilmer and William Macy and Ed O'Neill display. Chilling and involving and, unfortunately, all too believable.