I'm squatting beside a fire in the woods getting smoke blown in my face. Fourteen tired and angry teenagers are grumbling behind me, and I'm cooking burgers that I'm not going to eat while being quietly but steadily rained on - anyone who thought Projects was a skive, these points are the work part.

The kids have spent the morning doing community service with the local forestry fella. This year he's had them pulling up rhododendron seedlings all morning with the promise of lunch over an open fire in the afternoon. One of us was with them at all times of course, the plan being that we'd swap over at intervals. Plans (Max's especially) being inexact things, it ended up that poor old Regis spent all morning with the kids, Fiona and I collectively found them after each making unsucessful attempts (which in my case included an hour spend walking up and down the hill following bad directions) and Max has yet to show up - It's this part that's making the teenagers angry: He has the bread without which these damned burgers are a bit useless.