Two young rockers

It's a little weird getting used to having two young rockers in the house - especially when they go to gigs looking like this!

Ah well, I guess every generation has its weird fads in the teen years - I can't remember what they were in my teens, but my parents' generation had teddy boys and hippies, so this too shall probably pass!

Happy birthday, John!

Edit: okay - here's the promised photo. Better late than never.

Today is John's birthday. I will have to take a picture later on and add it to this post. The boys gave him music, and I gave him a voucher to spend a day driving a tank, a quadbike, a cannon thing and an armoured personnel carrier. He also got a DVD from his family in SA and my Mom sent some money, which he has yet to spend.

Tonight we're going out for dinner to a restaurant called Amici in Bedford (which is where I work - about 20 miles/32kms from home). It's the only place we have ever encountered good steak in the UK. The ridiculous thing is that it's an Italian restaurant, owned by Egyptians! Who'da thunk that you'd find better steak there than at one of the American-type eateries?

Björn's baptism

Tonight Björn got baptised. The two youngsters you see doing the honours are Andy and Fliss, the two youth cell leaders. Andy is Björn's cell leader, who appears to be developing quite and annointed preaching ministry and is really good at straight talk with the kids on subjects that matter to them.
Richard, the lead elder, read him Hebrews 6:19 about a hope and an anchor, and prayed that Jesus would be Björn's anchor. That there will be firm anchor through all of life's troubles.

Dan, one of the youth leaders, spoke to him about the fact that he has his ear pierced twice. Explaining that, when a freed slave chose to continue as a bond servant, his ear would be pierced as a symbol of his commitment. Also, in the Bible, when something is mentioned twice, it is to emphasise the significance of that truth. Dan prayed that Björn's double piercing would be symbolic of the depth of his commitment to be God's bondservant, and that this would be true of him all the days of his life.

John spoke of Joshua and Caleb and told him it was up to him to make good on the words spoken over his life.

I told him his abilities and talents afforded him a wide choice of adventures to embark on in his life, and that it was my prayer that he would embrace this one above all.

One young man spoke over Björn how he had seen Björn's heart change since he had been filled with the Holy Spirit, and encouraged him to use his natural competitiveness to push forward for God. A young girl with Down's also brought him a message, but sadly, due to her speech impediment, it was difficult to understand, but we think she was saying how she admired him and how the family would support him. Another young man brought him a section from Psalm 4, encouraging him to be a light in this age of drink, drugs and meaningless sex.

Equilibrium

I thought I would relate an incident from yesterday. I still laugh when I think about it – I just hope it works in writing, although I don’t have a great deal of confidence that it will.

John went to work as usual, since the trains were running (by some miracle). Björn went off to his girlfriend’s house on foot. This left Torvy and me at home. I was working via remote access, but Torvy was most disconsolate, since he had hoped to go to a friend’s house, but this fell through.

Once I had achieved my main goals for the morning, I decided to take a break and go and have a snowball fight with the lad. We were becoming increasingly energetic (I have a stiff throwing arm today, as evidence), when I took a snowball full in the face. “Hang on, Torvy,” I said, “I just need a moment to recover my equilibrium,” (an expression we use a lot in the family). But before I had even finished speaking, Torvy had shoved a snowball down my neck, producing an earsplitting shriek.

Less than a minute later, I took a very large snowball right in the eyes, and the crystals scratched my eyeballs something fierce (still sore today). I was standing there, hands over my eyes, totally unable to see, when my incorrigible son said with every semblance of concern, “Sorry, Mom. Do you need a moment to recover your equilibriaaaargh?”

You can imagine that this will be the norm, now. No-one will recover their equilibrium ever again. It will ever more be equilibriaaaaargh. What a goblin!

Tags:

• Snow

It snew!!!

This is the most snow we've had since arriving in the UK. Possibly the most we've had cumulatively. The school was closed and we were advised not to drive. So I stayed home and worked from here. Björn walked to Charlotte's house and spent the day there with friends. Torvy was let down by a friend, so I took a few breaks and let him destroy me in a snowball fight. See the photos on our flickr pages.

Good reports

The kids just got their reports, and both have done very well. At this stage they are rated by their teachers as to whether they are performing at, above or below the level expected of them. They are also given a rating of Excellent, Good, Fair or (heaven forbid) Causing concern for their effort, behaviour and homework in each subject.

Of course, Torvy is doing more subjects than Björn at this stage and has to persevere for two years with subjects in which he has no interest, before being allowed to make some selections at the end of Y9. His results show that he is performing as expected in most subjects. The only two subjects in which he is underperforming are science (which is sad, since it used to be his favourite before his current teacher ruined it for him - not a pleasant lady, both the boys have had her for science now, and she really is terrible at her job!) and design and technology (DT). He is exceeding expectations in art, dance and French. He scored a solid core of "goods" with a pinch of "fairs" and a liberal sprinkling of "excellents".

He hasn't had any exam results or teacher assessments, yet, but he is very diligent and is racking up the credits left and right. Fortunately for him, he is in a very high performing group (since they don't practice setting at this school, it is very much luck of the draw - Björn for example is in a fairly low achieving group, which does nothing to spur him on!). When he has done class tests, he has scored extremely high results, but has still been outperformed by a good proportion of the kids.

Björn is underperforming in English humanities - all his other subjects are "as expected". This teacher has identified him as having a great deal of potential and has spotted his tendency to coast, so she has made it her personal mission to get him to pull his finger out. She's doing a good job, too! He complains bitterly, but is forced to admit that she is no more than absolutely fair. Sadly, he scored no "above expecteds", but I think the expectations on him are very high. He is certainly being pegged for As and A*s in almost all his subjects. Like Torvy, he has a solid core of "goods", but in his case, the pinch is of "excellents" with the liberal sprinkling being of "fairs". His rating for homework was the poorest category. Now there's a surprise!

Björn also brought home a more detailed report, with the teachers commenting in more depth on his performance in each subject. These comments are of the sort that you would expect for a very bright kid who is coasting his way to above average results that are nevertheless lower than he is capable of achieving. However, the feedback from his science teacher has got me walking on a pink cloud of maternal pride:

"Björn's depth of knowledge in science never ceases to surprise me. He is an excellent student. His end of module test results are uniformly high and evidence that he spends time outside of lessons ensuring his knowledge is refreshed. With a more organised approach (Karyn's comment: Björn? Organised? Well, we can all dream, I guess!) to revision he could achieve an A* in this subject. Björn has an equiring mind and a sharp intellect and it is a pleasure having him in my Science group."

Björn is reaching the stage where he starts talking about selecting his A-level subjects. The norm is to do 3 of these, but he wants to do four: three sciences (physics, biology and chemistry) and maths. To our surprise, he is being discouraged by the teachers - not for putting all his eggs so very firmly in one basket, as you might expect, but for attempting to take on more than the required minimum. Fortunately the head of 6th form is prepared to override his teachers and let him have a go at the increased workload if he still wants to by the time he gets there. He has however, recommended that he spread his net a little wider, and we are encouraging him to consider other options. There are 28 subjects available at A level, so he is bound to find something else he wants to do.

In the meantime, he needs to pull his socks up and apply himself to get the sort of results he is capable of.

Hmm - perhaps not!

Yesterday I went to an exhibition in London. A colleague and I met on the station and decided to start the day in the expo food hall with a cup of coffee and a catch up on a team meeting the previous day. I asked, as I always do, whether they had decaff.

Brief interruption: When we were in the US we found that there was decaff available everywhere. And not just a sort of backup instant coffee deal. Proper coffee. Most civilised. The first time I asked at a small kiosk if they had decaff, the guy looked at me weirdly and said, "Of course!" Contrast that with the UK where they have decaff in some places, usually in the form of little sachets of instant. Bleagh! Even more extreme, in Sweden in 2001, the waitress at the coffee shop looked dazed and repeated slowly, "Caffeine-free coffee? Caffeine-free coffee?" She didn't quite say "Does not compute" out loud, but her face did!

Anyway, back to the story. The man proudly informed me that they did, indeed, cater to new age weirdos like me, and produced the inevitable sachet. Now read this next bit slowly. Preferably out loud.

He opened it with his teeth. WITH HIS TEETH, ladies and gentlemen!

I was still reeling from this, when the waitress started restocking the milk containers from a supply of the plastic bottles that are used in the UK. These have a plastic strip attached to the cap that runs around the neck of the bottle to prevent tampering and prove that the bottle has been unopened. The girl was tearing these off - you guessed it - with her teeth.

When it came to lunch time, I joined forces with another colleague and went to a nearby restaurant. I didn't want to take a chance that the staff in the food hall might have rolled the wraps with their tongues, or packaged the sandwiches with their feet!