Well, bar-be-que season is right around the corner. Isn't it kind of sad that so many of our innocent pleasures of days gone by have become sources of guilt and wanton self destruction in our modern world?

I mean, what could be more wholesome, more relational, than getting together with family and friends to gather in the backyard and break bread. Enjoying each other's company with the traditional grilled meat dinner with coleslaw and potato salad on the side, and a cold bevy of choice in the hand. I can picture it now after a long winter indoors, maybe some tunes in the background, the summer sun beating down, a little pick up football or frisbee to work up an appetite, you know what I mean.

How could this image possibly disturb my conscious? What's it all coming to? You can't even enjoy a nice juicy steak anymore without worrying about mad cow disease, steroids, transfats or rancid meat in the colon! How about the overproduction of methane gas into the atmosphere as livestock is bred in ever growing herds to meet (meat?) the demands of a growing population of humanity? Don't even get me started on hot dogs! (mmmmm....hotdogs......)

Well our worries are over. As Huxley said, it's a brave new world folks.

NASA has developed artificial edible meat growing technology for long term space flight, and the industrialists are licking their chops with the thought of mass production. (See what you started, Henry Ford?) The New Harvest website is promoting the development of what might well be called test tube steaks, and soon we might all have a beef growing machine in our kitchens right next to the bread maker.

More burgers anybody?