Quick plug (and apologies to readers outside of the Oxford Diocese) that due to the popularity of the training on "Working with Tweenagers" we are repeating it! April 14th, Church House, Oxford. Send me an e-mail for more details or booking information!
"It's a righteous disgrace, it's a sin and a shame
all of this garbage in Jesus' name!"
Don Fransisco
Rant Warning!
I talked before about flawed ecclesiologies and the "Field of Dreams" theology around, "If you build it they will come!" Well, there was an article in Mondays Times on a vision for a Holy Land theme park as a way of encouraging Biblical Knowledge in the 16-24 year old age bracket. Andrea Webster who is heading up this UK £144 million project says,
“I want the park to encompass the magic of the Bible and present it in a way that will be exciting and relevant.”
and also says
“I believe it’s a vision from God,” she said. “We need different ways to reach the youth of this country and it came to me in a flash that a biblical theme park would give people a fun day out but also teach them about the Bible in the process.”
I normally steer well away from being negative about stuff on the blog but I didn't know whether to laugh or cry over this quest for "relevance!"
I think I settled on laughing then crying and momentarily despairing!
Or am over-reacting? Will a trip to a sanctified Alton Towers be high on the youth group agenda in order for a Post Christian generation to discover God's revelation of himself?
I wrote a while back how surprised I was at how many people remember little about their adolescence, how they remember the facts of where they were etc but not the whole complicated extremes of being and becoming the person they are, the hormonal, emotional, roller-coaster of teenagerdom withs it's HIGH's and really LOW's! (I wondered if this is why society is so intolerant of teenagers, "YOU LOOK LIKE an adult (aside from the dress sense), BEHAVE LIKE ONE!") I was thinking though surely everyone remembers their first major crush, some may still even have scraps of the nail-bittingly bad poetry that it gave rise to. I guess girls, maturing quicker as they do, may handle the whole thing with some dignity intact! My blokey experience however is listening to achingly painful music and generally being pathetic in my doe eyed affections and wasting vast amounts of time just randomly walking near Welcombe Grove in the hope of "bumping into" the object of my doting devotion.
So fess up then? What do you remember?
And for bonus points, how can your experience be a useful reflection for youth work?
The band Chegal Guevara produced a great track that had the chorus,
"Oh I still know your number by heart
I don't know if it's love or if I'm smart
but I still know your number by heart"
(I still remember her phone number 22 years on)
Christ has died
Christ is Risen
Christ will come again
"Were the whole realm of nature mine,
That were a present far too small;
Love so amazing, so divine,
Demands my soul, my life, my all"
I'm enjoying this time off lark even if I don't feel 100% I have definitely caught up on some media today. Watched "Holes" which I thought was great, definitely some youth work stuff to draw from this film. I've had RSA on (German Radio station that plays mainly English 80's stuff, go figure), done some reading and taken in a fantastic animated series on 1 extra, it's called "Taggerz" and is a series of animated 10 minute programmes about a crew of Graffiti artists ..... you should have a look (Press release) I wish there was a way to record them and show them off-line as they'd make great discussion starters.
Only media downer is for once I wish we had a TV to see the first of the new Dr Who series on Saturday!
Only got to page 25 of "Practicing Passion" but have some time off now so hopefully more reading space. This was the quote that struck me today:
"The theological challenge youth pose to the church is blunt: Are we who we say we are? Do we practice passion, transformed by a Love who never disappoints, and live by a faith so convincing that we stake our lives on it? Or are we just another sagging social convention, like Dracula, that needs young blood to survive?" Dean
Got my new look front page on the Diocesan Web site, how funky is that? Just got to do loads of work on the content now. Feel free to send me stuff I can put on there especially questions for the FAQ section.
In Easter week I always wonder about Matthew 12:40 when Jesus says he will be "three days and three nights in the heart of the earth" which doesn't fit at all with our current Easter chronology. (I've heard preachers fudge this one on the basis of the timings of Hebrew days but it doesn't have any bearing on Jesus' distinct reference to three days and three nights).
In John's account however, he reports that the day after Jesus death was to be a "special sabbath" [19:31]! Could this "special sabbath" mean an additional day of sabbath akin to our idea of a bank holiday? I heard someone exploring this as an idea once and it fascinated me because where it led was: If there were two Sabbath days that week in light of the Passover then it would mean that Jesus was crucified on the Thursday and that Matthew 12:40 holds together, Just a thought!
Good article in the guardian on young people and mobile phones, the guidance is worth a read. It also reports that one estimate is that 25% of 7-10 year olds now have a handset!
Has anyone written anything on how mobile phone ownership impacts on youth work, good and bad?
I am currently using two different Browsers for meandering around on the web. IE6 is the only one that works with the blog and its kind of familiar. However Firefox means I'm a paid up member of the counter Microsoft liberation army. There's bit about both browsers I like though.
One REALLY cool thing about Firefox though is that if you're reading a web page you can highlight a piece of text, right click it and select "search web!" Firefox then does a google search in a seperate window that exists as a tabbed card. Cool huh? You can quickly look up about stuff that you're reading. Nice touch!
Having written the "A for Adolescence" post I've decided that I may continue to write a Youthwork A-Z for the web page but it won't work in its current form on the blog. I do however still have an idea to write an off-the-wall A-Z of youthwork with some of the more bizzare,obscure, accidental areas of youthwork! For example: W, Windows (breaking therof) and V, Vomit (see Minibus) Your suggestions please .......
I'm just starting to get my head round the summer, I'm not speaking anywhere this year so have a completely blank canvas. Am definitely going to Greenbelt (again) and that'll be a whole family trip, I'm going to make a youthblog banner to go alongside the "tribe" one!
I'm also going to most of Soul Survivor "B" ... If you are going please let me know as it's going to be very weird for me not having a group, It'll just be me, the skateboard, a tent and a pile of Pot Noodles!
"The Church is like a swimming pool; the splashing goes on at the shallow end" Most Revd Robert Runcie
Just remembered that I said that I'd upload the Youthwork magazine "Issues" list. If you look on the Resources page you'll find a Spreadsheet guide to all the subjects that have covered from 1992 to 2005!
I've written the first of the youthwork A-Z's which turned out to be a bit more serious than I'd planned. I'm still not sure whether this is a series for the blog or the Diocesan youth training page? I'll stick it into the blog for the moment though as it means your wisdom can contribute. Talking of which I really need a decent "B" for the next entry!
Talking of blog uncertainty, You have to read Skinny's blog prayer, it's fantastic! Click "continue reading"
ad•o•les•cence
NOUN:
1. The period of physical and psychological development from the onset of puberty to maturity.
2. A transitional period of development between youth and maturity
Adolescence is a period of huge change for young people that impacts them Physically, Emotionally, Culturally, Spirtitually, Intellectually and Socially. A period that has been described as "The Adolescent Storm" which is a a bit harsh but you can't go from being a child to a mature adult with out upheavel and complication.
Youthwork issues: Lots of people forget what Adolescence was like for them and are very intolerant of teenagers, this is further compounded by the fact that adolescents now look like adults and therefore "should" behave like adults (even though it's not unusual for the behaviour expected by the adult to not be modelled by the adult). A role of a youth worker is being an advocate for young people.
It's also the time that young people really need friendship and support as well as opportunity to grow into their adult roles, this unfortunately coincides with the point that Society pushes them away! Youth work roles therefore include not only "walking" with young people on this journey but helping parents/community to understand that adolescence is an important process.
Really interesting post from Diana today on getting the traditional Church to recognise that there needs to be new things happening. Her reflection began from discovering there was a clock winding rota and she asks:
How do we encourage those who are stalwart members of the Church and on the clock winding rota etc to see that the church as it is will not be the answer to everyone's needs? I am not asking for them to enjoy the alternatives on offer but simply to accept that for some there need to be alternatives.
Good question I thought and I reckon that the clock produces a thinking point for of the changes that have taken place, in fact it's a good metaphor. The clock was originally put there so the people of the town would look to the tower in order to find out the time. Things however have changed and most people have many different sources to draw from to know the time, watches, mobile phone, computers etc. Where once they would have automatically looked to the Church there are now no end of competing sources of chronological information! It's the same with Faith, where people would have automatically looked to the Church they now view it like the tower clock as inaccurate, archaic and irrelevant to modern day life. If Christians don't recognise new forms of church and the neccessity of mission then it won't just be the clock that winds down and stops!
I have a list on my blog-roll page of books that are currently on the go, I guess they are there so you you might think, "Hey that looks interesting!" and pick up a copy just as I do with other peoples reading lists! However "Practicing Passion" by Kenda Creasy Dean cannot idly sit in the reading list passively suggesting the possibility of reading, this book HAS to be read if you are involved with youth ministry! It's a finely crafted, deeply theological practical inspiration with a passionate heart for God and for young people with some vital things to say to us and the Church.
Anyway, you get the point!
"Most congregations confine Divine passion to Holy Week, and view adolescent passion as a hormonal rite of passage, not as the fingerprint of God. Prevailing wisdom suggests that passion, like algebra and acne, should be endured not exegeted" Dean
Have you ever thought about how it is that YOUR mind works? I have the most bizarre thoughts then mentally run with them ..... but I don't know if this is how other people think or not. I remember a girlfriend saying, "you're weird" when I'd described a thought process that occupied most of the journey to see her. The scenario was, I had this bizarre thought that the next hitch-hiker I picked up would be Bruce Cockburn (Canadian singer songwriter) but it was followed by the thought that I wouldn't be sure it was him .... I then ran mentally for ages with how many of his album titles and track titles I could work into the imaginary conversation that was developing in my mind. Thus seeing if I could spot a reaction and therefore know it really was him! So blog buddies, am I weird or is this normal cognitive behaviour?
Oh yes, the point of this pre-amble was that yesterday I had this great idea for an A-Z of youth work! I thought it'd be fun to write a humorous, useful, reflective piece letter by letter on youthwork. This is what occupied most of my driving time yesterday! (the pre-amble was just because it had made me wonder if we all think in roughly the same way)
Anyway, need your help with this A-Z of youthwork, ran out of thinky space before I'd come up with anything for "Q" "Z" "Y" "J" and obviously "X" your suggestions for these letters and any others REALLY appreciated.
Oh, really need better ones than I came up with for "n" "k" and "b" too!
(Was looking at some Freud yesterday, in the german original he doesn't use the latin, id, ego and superego it's rendered as the it, the "I" and the super I ..... thought you should know!)
Great article from Andy Goodliff, he's used a Pastoral model to look at Youth Ministry in a whole church context, read it here!
It culminates in a useful list of "resources" for youth ministry:
1. Spirituality
2. Training
3. Theology
4. Care for the Youth Worker
5. Companionship
My worst ever morning in my Youthwork career was the one where a letter arrived indicating that legal action was being taken against me. It's a bit cliche'd but I did actually feel physically sick, it was a horrible moment.
The story was this, three years previously to the letter I had been leading a ski trip. One of the teenagers had taken a tumble when a bunch of them were messing around and had twisted her knee. Myself and another leader had looked at the knee and gone for the RICE approach (Rest, Ice (for once this was readily available), Compression and Elevation). The next day she had insisted that she was OK to ski and I'd allowed her to.
Three year later, the letter stated the girl in question was having on-going knee problems as a result of the injury and levelled negligence against me for incorrect diagnosis and failure to get professional medical attention. My first concern was for the girl but the letter from the insurance company forbade me from having any contact or conversation with the family.
Not a great morning! I'd gone from my normal easy going self to feeling sick, frightened and worried! I went over what I could remember of the incident (three years on) time after time and what I might have done differently!
Anyway here's the point about Logs. Three years on I had handed on the ski trip to another leader and had not kept my records. I had no written account of the incident and that was scary, nothing to back up my account, none of the details and context at all.
Fortunately the accounts from other leaders verified the details and there was no case for negligence on my part. The relief that no action was taken against me was enormous but I still feel tremendous sadness that the girl in question has had problems as a result of the trip.
Residentials are fantastic for the development of young people! Youth work rocks! BUT do the risk assessments, work hard at Health and Safety AND keep a log of all incidents and interventions, get everything written down ..... and keep it retrevable for a LONG time!
Useful: Kens Resource Page. lots of good stuff for youth ministry and well laid out!
Funny: Bible quiz doping probe! Courtesy of the crazy lot at Lark News
Oxford Diocese: Saltmine Theatre Company coming to Wokingham and Oxford in May
UK Techy: Just picked up a fab offer from BT, they're offering their 250 mins openzone wifi package for £2 a month for 3 months, no strings attached (well as long as you cancel it or it goes onto a 12 month contract at £10 a month)
DVD Ripper: Finally found one that works well for getting clips into Powerpoint, it's called AoA, and it's easy to use. ($34)
Onmebus beat me to blogging about the Passion recut so I'll have to trump him with a little more information (am I too competitive?). It will be released in Britain on March 25th, it's 6 mins shorter and the editting has allowed it to gain a UK "15" certificate instead of the "18" it carried originally. There's a preview in London next Wednesday (16th), I may be able to get you a free ticket if you're up for that and can let me know your thoughts!
I'm aware that quite a lot of the discussion about Time management was related to employed youth work positions even though it's critical for the volunteers too, more so! I was thinking about this and reflecting on my time as a volunteer leader, in terms of getting the most out of limited availability I thunked the following:
1. Recognise that this is a ministry
2. Say no to other jobs in the church in order to invest what energy/time you realistically have the most effectively.
3. Enable the young people to own, be involved with and help deliver the programme
4. If at all possible get to some form of training where you are with other volunteers. This is a massive boost in terms of ability, encouragement and confidence.
5. If there's a team of you, do something fun as a team
6. Be clear with yourself and the Church what time you can give.
Just a few thunks! I reckon number 2. is critical so I attach a couple of resources to help with that!
A sound File to use as a No! Download file
A detailed crafted written response: Download file
Red Nose Day! UK wide serious fundraising sillyness, Have Fun!
Depressingly the red hair dye virtually doesn't show up in my hair but I am all suited up today and wearing a red shirt, sporting a red cravat and red hanky in the pocket :-)
Let me know about any Comic Relief Malarky you do with the youth groups!
The discussion around working hours and Time Off triggered quite a few comments. The overall feel was that it's a privilege to do what we do but it's a real challenge keeping it in balance!
Here's some stuff that wiser people have taught me over the years and which have worked for me:
1. Block out Time off well in Advance, plan the year! If you don't it becomes difficult to take some meaningful space.
2. If someone wants you to do something never say "Yes" there and then
it's too easy to say yes just because there's a space in your diary. Get them to write or e-mail with a clear idea of what they'd like you to do. You then have the space to think/pray and it's easier to say No if necessary.
3. If the answer is NO be very clear about that rather than introducing maybes which only lead to stress
4. When booking things into your diary make sure you are looking at the context of the whole week/period. It's very easy to just look at the page and think it's fine, then later realise it's the day after a residential and the day before a major presentation for example.
5. Evaluate and re-evaluate, put time for this in the diary.
6. Without time and space to pray or think you and your job suffer.
Oh and number 7. I was taught by a Methodist Minister. People tend to look over your shoulder and if your diary is free that day expect you to be able to do what they've asked. In order to make sure you have some time/space write phantom or coded things in, these are ones I like:
"Family maintenance Seminar" (evening off)
"Cultural Engagement Study evening" (Cinema trip)
"Space, prayer and reflection practical" (going for a walk)
Great article from Doug on criticism of emerging Church, really liked his humour, grace but straight talking engagement!
My youth group were very concerned that my job as a Parish Youth Worker involved a bit of a con on the part of my employers. I remember one of them giving me a bit of a lecture at one point that went something like:
"Ian, because you work for the Church you have to work the weekend, yes?"
me: "yep"
"So you work BOTH days at the weekend, right?"
me: "yep"
"And because of this you get A day off in the week instead?"
me: "Yep"
"AND DOES THAT MAKE SENSE IAN?"
Diana has written a bit about T.O.I.L and it certainly is a challenge to work out a work/life balance when ministry is also a calling.
I went for a job in Basingstoke quite a few years ago and the vicar made it very clear to me that they expected employees to do a 45 hour contract week PLUS do another 15-20 hours to match the best of the volunteers! (Thankfully I didn't get the job)
In my current job I monitor my hours .... I just drop the hours into a spreadsheet I built (and went a bit over the top with) and at the end of the work it tells me my working hours, average hours per working day, percentages against contract and time off owed. Trouble is, what do I then do with that information?
(Just opened the post and YPN has a whole article about the amount of unpaid overtime that the youth service relies on)
I was asked a question about Good Practice guidelines for work with young people. Our "Better Safe Than Sorry pt 2" document is a great read on Good Practice. For that any the other policies relating to Child Protection/Health and Safety click ye here.
I blogged before about how Mark from the youth group had said with genuine incredulity, "You don't have to know anything to be a youth worker!" I still laugh about this! Having been involved in some interviews yesterday I was thinking again about knowledge and skills, especially how we know what we know and how we identify what we don't know!
There's a brilliant summary of four stages of learning that's really helpful on recognising how we develop, it runs through four steps as below:
Unconscious incompetence
We don't know what we don't know, we do a job not recognising what we are lacking
Conscious incompetence
We start to realise where things are not going well, things that could be done better. We recognise that we could improve, we see skills that we need to acquire.
Conscious competence
We acquire skills and abiliies through training, reflection and experience. We deliberately employ these in order to do the job well.
Unconscious competence
At this stage we have so absorbed the learning and experience that we deploy it without conscious thought, it becomes the obvious thing to do.
This model identifies a danger. If you have reached level four in a particular area it has become akin to "common sense" for you, you may forget that what seems obvious to you is not obvious!
I like to think this is why Mark thought that Youth Workers didn't need to know anything :-)
This is a session that I've been meaning to write up for ages. I wanted to run a session with the Parish based youth workers on "Time Mangement" but thought this was a non starter as:
a) No-one would come
b) It can be the most depressing guilt-inducing oppresive subject around!
c) Time management trainers either have their lives so together they clearly hail from a different planet or their professional persona is merely and only, a persona!
I still however wanted to do something though that would collectively and indivdually challenge us as it's so easy to end up SO busy in Ministry because there is always things we can/could/might/should be doing!
The way forward seemed to be around Vision. So the attached resource is about looking at all the jigsaw pieces that make up our work and looking at the jigsaw pieces we would like to be doing if we had time! The exercise then asked what is the "Vison?" i.e the picture on the front of the box in this metaphor, that is the combination of your calling, role and job description. Then being able to look at each of the pieces against this vison and ask, "Should they be part of what I do?"
Pdf copy: Download file
For my employed youth ministry bretherin and sisterin this could be useful, fun and a potential blog gathering! It's a day on Spirituality and Young People on 20th April. It's been run by Churches Together and you'll find the flyer ........... here!
Great article in the Times with the above title. It's all about new expressions of Church and encouragingly it's about Oxford Diocese! (Did I mention that's where I work?)
STOP PRESS: Have just heard about a new project in the Diocese which will have 50% of the time focused on exploring a new expression of Church for under 25's!
In light of the above and Jonny Baker's take on there being a climate of the C of E putting the "can" back into Anglican when it comes to New Expressions of Church, things start to look quite encouraging!
I work with quite a lot of churches who have lost touch with young people but want to make a difference, they feel though they could never run a "youth group" so they feel there's nothing they can do! I try and get them to think outside of the youth group model and to be asking what the needs are in their community. In line with that here's a great story that Nick Lear (Baptist legend and top blokey) told me:
A Church on a housing estate had (if I remember rightly) an ageing congregation but a big heart! In looking out at their community they took an interest in the teenagers that congregated outisde of their church every weekday morning waiting for the school bus. They discovered that many of the young people had not had any breakfast! The Church thought I'd would be great if they could really bless those young people and do something practical SO every Friday morning they'd cook lots of Bacon Butties and share breakfast with the teens free of charge! How cool is that? A Friday celebration of food and chat as well as meeting a need.
It's a story that really encouraged me, to imagine all those great conversations happening over Bacon butties! The Church getting to know, to listen to young people from the estate. That's the kind of stuff I'm talking about!
Had a good meeting with Christian Aid this morning, it was great to catch up with some of the stuff they do!
If you're a youth leader then it is WELL worth signing up for their M:Power material which is the biz. I also wanted to flag up their "Wake up to Trade Justice" ALL-NIGHTER in london on April 15th, they're really going to town on making it youth friendly and safe ..... see if you can take a group to a night they won't forget! Slightly further ahead (July) they are also running a trip to lobby the G8 summit in Glasgow and here's the cool bit, may well charter a train to get there! How cool would that be, 600 people enjoying a mobile party on the way to Make a Difference to the rest of the world! Sarah Clay is the local contact.
Other local stuff, Quench (top band!) are playing a gig in Oxford on March 18th, definitely worth being at! Details here!
Am dashing to a meeting so in lieu of a post for the moment, here's a link that Cris sent me (thanks) to Blog Almighty. Enjoy!
Ok I know this sounds like one of my more bizarre entries but I found this on Deputy blog and hey it's an interesting reflection! The idea being that are we as Youth Ministers effective by nature of the resources we have available (Batman) or by the internal resources (Spiderman)? Good question I thought. I got distracted while I was thinking about this and found a "Which superhero are you" quiz and came out as Spiderman, sorted!
I quite like this "Superhero" idea though because there is some resonance with youth work. I guess not so much the super hero powers although valuing and liking young people is quite a gift. It's the area of being misunderstood and a failure to recognize our "super" work, as in:
"What EXACTLY do you do all day?"
"When are you going to get a proper job?"
"You're wasting your time trying to do anything with THAT guy/girl!"
"Some of us work for a living!"
"That's the trouble with you do-gooders!"
Misunderstandings aside, it is an incredible role that we have eh!
I'm facing a couple of big ethical qustions regarding the blog today. First off "Pictures" Is it legitimate to lift and use pictures from the google images board? I've always avoided using any original work or copyrighted stuff but today someone called into question the using of small pictures that exist on lots of sites and google. OK or not?
Secondly, "Wi-fi" I'd got a couple of urgent e-mails to send while I was out and about so I drove down a suburbian street looking for a wi-fi signal. Third place I parked gave me an unencrypted signal and hence I'm blogging? I'm not sure what the ethics are of using a freely available signal and connection?
If anyone has a well developed tech-ethic, I'd love your opinion!
I spent a really encouraging morning with Andy Freeman at Reading's new Boiler Room. I love the 24-7 movement and the emphasis on Prayer, justice and misssion ... Inspirational stuff. They have a fantastic building and great vision. The launch will be on March 26th. I'm really excited about there being a "millenium 3 monastry" in the Diocese! If you've got money, time, paint or skills then I'm sure they'd love to hear from you. Lorraine looks after the management side.
Thanks for all the wisdom and humour on my speaking condundrum. The vicar kindly rang me and has agreed to re-promote it as "Spirituality and teens, what young people can teach us" ..... phew, much happier :-) Now all I need to do is write the talk!
I wrote once before on Recipriversexclusions, a concept from Douglas Adams that I applied to invitations to preach or teach. The concept being that a significant detail will vary from the invitation received. My favourite up until now was being asked to Preach at a Youth Service on "Sexuality" and having set up lots of multimedia and the opening track on "Let's talk about Sex baby" to set the tone (loud) I had a bit of a surprise. The Church was packed AND there were NO teenagers!
My latest stress though perhaps eclipses this, I am due to give a lent talk on Youthwork and the importance of listening to teenagers.
Last night however I found out the talk has been publicised as "The Spirituality of Children, why it's important to listen young people!"
AAAaarrrrgghghghghghg!!!! You could write what I know about Children's spirituality on the back of a postage stamp with room to spare. I have not had time to set up the code for a proper online survey but nontheless, I ask you if I should:
1. Politely decline the gig citing ignorance of the subject matter
2. Chew off my own foot so I can hide in the hospital casualty department
3. Start the talk off by saying, "Now for something completely different"
4. Try and speak on Childrens spirituality
5. Ask my 8 year old daughter to do the talk instead
6. Join the French Foreign Legion
I thought I'd come across the above phrase on Gavin's blog, Hit the back button but I can't find it now so I may be wrong. Anyway definitely suffering from MBD at the moment and am committing Bookamy on a massive level. Currently "on the go" I have all these books in my life:
Generous Orthodoxy
Stories of emergence
Book of uncommon prayer
Round Ireland with a fridge
Christianity in a post athiest age
Adventures in Missing the Point
I couldn't resist Brian McLaren's book because the subtitle is fantastic: "Why I am a missional, evangelical, post/protestant, liberal/conservative, mystical/poetic, biblical, charismatic/contemplative, fundamentalist/calvinist, anabaptist, anglican, methodist, catholic, green, incarnational, depressed-yet-hopeful, emergent, unfinished Christian!"
Definitely need to get some of these finished, especially as I'm awaiting the arrival of a DVD called "Blizzard of Aaaarghs" which is a "Rockumentry of some of the best bad boy ski action ever" I LOVE this film and lost my VHS copy a couple of years ago but have just discovered it's on DVD! So if anyone fancies watching this with me, shout! OH and if you fancy a shorter read then here's a link I lifted from Gavin, Parents go on strike over lazy teenagers! Will blog later, I have some reading to do now!
