Some of you may think that school lunches are just an item mentioned on the school requirements list. To me they have recently become the most convenient thing since sliced bread! I only wish I had embraced the school lunch idea much earlier.

Now I do not have to load my kids with monotonous carbohydrate filled sandwiches, (whatever the filling it is still a sandwich), I do not have to make meal plans myself and I do not have to keep buying plastic lunch boxes branded with the latest action hero for kids.

Perhaps only someone who has similar sentiments to mine can appreciate my joy when I discovered that the hot school lunch the school offered is not that horrible afterall and they are actually changed through the week.

That means less time spent on planning, making and packing lunches and more time left to do other things... like supervising homework for example or simply more family time! Even better, I do not have to buy containers and lunchboxes I despise. Only a piece of fruit for the children to take to compliment the hot lunches the school provides.

llow me to digress a little - what is this strange craze going around where every action hero must have distorted facial features and seems to be a cross between a monster and a strange machine? Or do they just keep transforming from a little sweet girl or boy into a strange supernatural monster or gigantic machine?

Indeed times have changed. In my time we had Spiderman, Batman and Superman who mostly retained their human form, save for the really cool superhero costume. Is that not cool anymore? Nowadays it is machines and aliens galore! What with the likes of the Transformers and the exceedingly popular Ben10.

Back to the subject of lunches and lunch boxes...

I hate cold lunches and I would not like my children to have a cold sandwich for lunch. When it comes to school made lunches, I am usually a bit skeptical so it was very begrudgingly that I scoured the supermarket shelves for an appropriate lunch box. Perhaps I am a bit too picky but what I saw made me want to raise a loud protest!

All lunch boxes either had gruesome images of some superhero or other (to be honest I did not recognise many of them) or to be full of sparkly fairy tale creatures like unicorns and fairies, which I found too childish and cheesy!

Honestly, I would rather take one with the image of a dinosaur any day, or even Mickey mouse. What happened to Walt Disney characters? I do not think that I am that out of touch then again, maybe I am. But the last time I checked, the Disney channels were still very popular with the kids I know. Even the teenagers have an age relevant Disney channel.

Then again perhaps I am confused and my age is showing.