Improving functionality

I haven't been on newschoolers properly for a fair while, and coming back i like the look and feel of the site.

i only have two ideas which would improve the user experience.

1) make the black header (where all the navigation links are) collapsable. similar to the bar at the bottom of macs. but instead of disappearing completely it just goes back to a thin bar the size of "news forums etc". then when you hover your mouse over it the rest of it drops down. currently i feel like it is taking up too much space on the screen.

2) when click on a photo it enlarges a higher quality version, similar to Facebook.


thanks