School starting: A blessing or a curse?

Does my post title have anything to do with What’s for dinner? No, but
Among other things, yes it does. (Shit, now I can’t use this line again, can I?) Anyway, like most everyone else’ kid, at least in Utah, school started on Monday for my son Talon (going into the 9th grade) and Brittanie (going into the 11th grade). Blessing because, a)I don’t have to worry about whether or not the house will be standing when I get home, and, b)Curse, because I have to start monitoring things like how much lunch money do I need to fork out; and is the phone call I get every day from the school regarding absences really valid (yes, I’ve gotten 2 already.. I shit you not), and a plethera of other crap that isn’t worth my time to mention, or yours, because either a)you’re there, or have been there, or b)you’re gonna be there one day and you don’t wanna hear it. Either way, it’s exhausting and if I had my way, I’d hibernate through the school year and let hubs deal. So since there’s no way around it, I’ll do as we all do, and I’ll brace myself for what I am HOPING is to be a better year than last. My husband went to Afghanistan for 6 months last December and it was quite a, well, how do I put it nicely, um, well, EXPERIENCE to be a single mother to 3 kids for that period of time. That is beside the point though.
My taste buds are still quite iffy, and my desire to cook has diminished but not escaped me completely. Last night was pathetic. Frozen fish sticks and tater tots. Not that normally I wouldn’t like that meal, because every once in a while, I dig that kinda stuff, but last night, UGH, it almost literally made me ill. So tonight we had some pasta with roasted cauliflower, red onion, and garlic. And it was a hit! I noticed the recipe had no protein, so I added some toasted pine nuts and “real” bacon bits, and yeah, even the kids dug it. (I bought a new plate for pictures.. and I decided I just might start collecting plates for the sake of “plating”..)

Oh, and the other night, I needed to do something with all of the arugula I had (have I mentioned, I ABSOLUTELY LOVE ARUGULA??????) So I made a salad with It (arugula, I refer to it as It, as one may refer to Him as God), new potatoes and a rotisserie chicken. Really freaking good.. and so I decided that a picture of the preparation was prettier than the actual salad:

Unfortunately I was never able to taste that salad. Not even the next day for lunch. I have to say, this anomaly of not being able to taste my food, AND GAINING WEIGHT at the same time has me really concerned. I made an appointment with my ENT doc, but he’s booked a month out, so I can’t see him til September 24th or some shit. I guess that my love for cooking doesn’t die out with my taste buds because I still want to do it. Such is life i guess.