Straits Times Dec 14, 2004

Parents on strike over naughty kids

MRS Cat Barnard has become America's real-life desperate housewife. She and her husband, Harlan, are on strike.

They are sick of kids who do not do their chores and do not show respect, and have left the house in the hands of their 12-year-old daughter Kit and their 17-year-old son Ben.

The strike took Benjamin and Kit by surprise. They came home from school on Monday to find their mother outside with handwritten signs that read 'Parents on Strike' and 'Seeking Cooperation and Respect!'

Mrs Cat Barnard, a stay-at-home mother, and her 56-year-old husband, a government social services worker, decided their children needed to learn about empathy and responsibility.

The Barnards now live in a cramped tent on the front lawn of their Deltona, Florida, home, and they plan to stay there until the kids start behaving.

The paparazzi love the show and are now permanent fixtures on the Barnards' once-sleepy street.

The strike seems to have struck a nerve. The phone has been ringing incessantly with requests for media interviews. Passers-by have shouted out words of encouragement.

One woman driving past the Barnards' house rolled down her car window on Wednesday and shouted: 'Good for you! You should put the kids outside!' \-- WASHINGTON POST, ASSOCIATED PRESS

i hope my parents dun do tt 2 me.......