Got a few questions on tire rotation and alignment.

I'm in the process of getting new tires and I'm trying to decide WHO to
buy them from. I would really like to give the business to the Ma and Pa
shop down the road, but I'm planning on traveling and reloacating soon
and I'm thinking that maybe I should go with a larger supplier (Like
Sears or NTB) so that they will do free rotations for me. But I wonder
if that is really neccessary. Couldn't I rotate my tires myself ? The
big questions are as follows:

1) When you rotate tires, do you have to re-balance them?

2) What is the proper rotation? I always thought that it was a kind of
criss-cross rotation, but looking in my VW owners manual last night,
they say keep the left tires on the left and the right tires on the
rigth and just switch the front tires with the back tires. ???

3) I know that when you get new tires, you should get your front end
aligned. Does this also apply when you rotate your tires?

4) How hard is an alignment to do myself?

Any help appreciated.
Peace - donna
'84 Westy (Pepe)