Thanks for the info Harv; I had been looking in the Apple System Profiler. Doesn't that seem like a logical place for the firmware information?
The firmware appears to be current, so I update Toast from 5.1.4 to 5.2. I haven't tested it yet, but DiscBurner seems to work just fine, so I am assuming that this is a Toast-related glitch.
My primary concern is that something is worng with the CD-R burner, seeing as how my one-year warranty just expired and I just could not make myself purchase AppleCare... But all seems well, since the burned data is accessible, so What, me Worry???