Despite having to dodge the occasional homicidal pupil and bits of falling masonry, not all is doom and gloom on the school front.
The humble meat pie is back in the canteen.
It is also possible that cream doughnuts, salt and vinegar crisps and even fizzy drinks may make a comeback.
Tuck shop duty had become very monotonous, with little left to confiscate.
The tuck shop scabs were a thing of the past.
Who wants to bludge miso soup or seaweed sushi? As for chicken wraps, it's virtually impossible to tell when the packaging ends and the wrap begins.
Middle-aged, overweight teachers were forced to jump the back fence with all the fat kids at lunch time just to get a decent cholesterol fix.
At least fat kids are flexible. Fat teachers are not.
My local physio has named her new ablutions at the bach after me.
The proliferation of cheap bakeries and fast food joints near schools will soon be a thing of the past.
I could never understand the rationale behind the food Nazi legislation restricting food sold in schools to exotic non-edibles.
Supposedly, we were all meant to live longer, allowing us to clog the geriatric departments in our under-funded hospitals.
Surely cardiac arrest is a more economically efficient demise than decades spent drooling in the Alzheimer's unit? Greenie politicians seem to have a fetish for legislating all aspects of human behaviour.
Those who were the most anti-authority before they got their snouts in the perks trough of parliament morph into Stalinist fascists as soon as they gain power.
All because someone misspelt their name on a party list.
At least the real fascists got the trains running on time.
Our politicians have this wonderful delusion that they can legislate against ill health and death and any other human instinct they disapprove of.
Now it looks as though they intend moving back on to alcohol.
They never seem to appreciate the law of unintended consequences.
Jim Anderton's tax on fortified wines was the catalyst for the wildly successful market in alcopop drinks.
Pensioners who self-medicated against the ravages of old age with the occasional sherry were cruelly cast aside.
Their demise heralded the rise of the teenage female boozehound high on sickly alcopops designed to avoid Jim's tax threshold.
I've always been sceptical of the workings of the free market and the sovereignty of consumer choice, but if it means I don't have to rip my trousers jumping the back fence each lunch time, I'm all for it.
I do have a few misgivings about the health impacts on our youth, but I suspect something as disgusting as miso soup and seaweed sushi will eventually prove to be carcinogenic.
Certainly having four chins and a large frontal overhang provides decent non-subsided insulation during the winter.
I know its not PC, but I celebrate the return of the mince pie to the tuck shop.
The scabs are back loitering outside like vultures on the savannah.
So is the fetid smell of hot greasy mince. Maybe if this anti-smacking thing is repealed we could consider the reintroduction of corporal punishment.
I could then cancel my gym membership, if I could find the card.
• Peter Lyons is an economics teacher with ambitions to teach health science.
