My mother is coming out to visit for the holiday season. My sister and I have mapped out flowchart of activities to cover our bases for that week, and if we don't deviate from it, I think we'll be okay. My copy is a page from a month calendar, with the week in question full of little jotted notes and a few scribbles on the back. Kristi's copy is the same, with the difference of a whole notebook dedicated to the details, like what we'll be making for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and what board games are suitable for playing on what day. I know this sounds extreme. But it's the way it has to be.

My mom is predictable in the things she likes to do. She comes out to visit once a year, and inevitably we go through the same routine when she arrives.

1) I get the once over, like I'm a horse she's thinking of buying, and if there's anything drastic about my appearance(tattoos or, say, purple hair) that she hasn't seen yet, she'll tsk tsk.

2) We drop off her stuff at my house or my sister's, depending on where she's staying. Our living arrangements change so often that it's always a new landscape for my mom to sniff around and comment on. Like a dog going for a visit to a new place. She doesn't drink out of the toilet though. She does open cupboards. This time, I know she'll hone right in on the two pieces of Tupperware that just got stained last week by some tomato sauce. She'll pick them up and say, "This didn't have to happen. It's a shame, really. You know you can just spray some Pam in there before you put your leftovers in and it won't get discolored like this."

3) We'll talk about what to have for dinner. She'll say she doesn't want a big heavy meal. "How about we whip up something easy and light?" And here she'll pause and look contemplative, as if she's accessing a light and easy database, and then she'll say, "I know, how about taco salad?" and she'll head for the fridge to pull out the ground beef that she assumes is in there. After seven years of her first night request being taco salad, we have learned to have the ingredients on hand. But I don't want anyone to think that I'm the sort of person who keeps american cheese and a chub of ground beef in my fridge.