If you expect that it will be really hot — all that tarmac absorbing the sun and radiating it back up to you — you’ll be happy.

If you expect that the price of admission — around $15 — plus the parking is the most you’ll spend that day, you’ll be grievously disappointed.

Unless you’ve been living in a cave, you’ve heard about Jeff Bezos’ insanely extravagant wedding to former TV news personality Lauren Sanchez in Venice, that cost approximately the gross national product of several small third-world countries. (And, of course, the Kardashians were there.)

Well, that could be comparable to your day at the Orange County Fair, especially if you can’t tear yourself away from the fried Twinkie stand.

Last time I took my kids, I calculated afterward that a day at Disneyland wouldn’t have cost much more, which would be fine as long as you have prepared yourself emotionally. It’s like buying a house. Just know that you’re going to spend way more than you’ve planned, and you’ll be able to get over the shock.

It is possible to do lots of fun things at the fair for cheap or free, in fact I just wrote a story listing many of them. If you make a list and focus on doing these things, it’s affordable. Also, if you bring your own food, you’ll be less hungry and won’t buy that turkey leg that costs more than your first car. I always find turkey legs so disappointing, anyway, because there’s less meat on the bone than I expect, and you really have to gnaw to get it. Anyway, don’t go to the fair hungry. Fatal error.

They let you bring in soft coolers (no hard-sided ones), but I like to bring everything in a grocery bag with a frozen water bottle to keep it all cold, and then throw it all away afterward, so I don’t have to haul it around. Don’t try to bring in glass, cans or booze unless you want to get kicked out, or at least scolded.

It’s easy to spend your life’s savings on carnival rides, unless you’re me. I get so nauseous on thrill rides that I avoid them, even if it means I have to sit on a bench for an hour, watching everyone else having fun. Have you ever noticed how people seem to take personal offense that you won’t go on the ride with them and harangue you mercilessly, like a missionary trying to convert you?

The last time I succumbed to such hectoring, I was persuaded to go on this ride that went upside down, even though I knew the results would not be pretty. I ended up barfing all over the person who’d hounded me, which I considered to be poetic justice. And, after that, I just starting saying no thanks, and eventually people do give up.

In a funny sort of occurrence, I spent several years covering the business of Disneyland for the newspaper, which necessitated going to the park several times a week. Many people told me how “lucky” I was to be able to go to Disneyland for a living. Now, I admit it was a good gig compared to digging sewer trenches or being a Walmart greeter all day.

But I don’t enjoy many of the rides there due to my extreme motion sickness, and when you go anywhere for work, even Disneyland, it loses its carefree appeal.

So I save money at the fair by skipping the carnival rides, although when I bring the kids, I just hand them my wallet and give up. I do try to avoid the shopping pavilions, because it’s just so easy to decide your life won’t be complete without that Wonder Mop you’ll never see anywhere else. (Although I have friends who go to the fair just to go shopping.)

But, oh, the smells of the food. You never smell Brussels sprouts cooking at the fair. It’s always something that our psyches are primevally pumped to crave, like bacon. Every edible item at the fair is wrapped in bacon, dipped in chocolate, sprinkled with sugar and fried. Even the vegetables.  This year, there’s bacon cotton candy. And a cheddar bacon doughnut. For real. They should invent a diet aid that blocks your olfactory glands temporarily, so you could make it through these events without consuming 4,000 calories. Although fair food has no calories, like when you’re on vacation.

In case I’ve caused you to yearn for something deep fried and dipped in sugar, the fair this year runs from July 18 through Aug. 17. Maybe I’ll see you there.

I wish he’d earn his keep by doing chores, or at least get a SAG card and work as an actor, but he regularly reminds me that he’s a companion dog, according to the dog manuals. This means it’s just his job to sit on my lap and listen to me yell at the stupid people on HGTV’s “House Hunters,” who always complain that the apartment in Paris they’re considering buying doesn’t have the same amenities as their giant ugly house in Texas.

“Then go back to Texas, you fools,” I always shout at the TV. “You don’t deserve to live in Paris.” And Lil Wayne agrees by licking my face, which is part of the job description for companion dogs.

Well, OK, I’m sort of making that part up. He no longer licks my face or any other part of my anatomy, because I hate licking dogs, and with great patience and effort, I trained him to stop doing it. I know some of you are anxious to know how I did this.

When the pink tongue came out and touched any part of my anatomy, I would push him down off my lap and say sternly, “No licking.” Sounds simple, right? Except for the fact that I had to do this 8,422 times in a row. It took that long for his slightly dense canine brain to register, “Oh, wow. She doesn’t like to be licked, and if I do it, she won’t pet me anymore.”

That was a few years ago, and he still mostly follows the rule. When he forgets, again I push him down and tell him no licking. This is complicated because my daughter, Curly Girl, lets him lick her when she comes to visit. I keep asking her to stop, but unfortunately, apparently I didn’t train her as well as I trained Lil Wayne.

That’s the only thing I’ve ever been able to train a dog to do, though, because I just don’t have any patience. I’d like to blame it on the fact that I’m now at the “get off my lawn” phase of life, but, truthfully, I never had any patience to start with. It seems an utter miracle to me that somehow I raised two reasonably polite and law-abiding children to adulthood without either of them being sentenced to federal prison, when I can’t even teach a dog to walk properly on a leash.

I know, now some of you are going to email me and tell me it’s easy and you’ll give me instructions. But, seriously, I’ve tried. I’ve read books. I watched “The Dog Whisperer.” I was the alpha dog. I held the leash tightly in the correct hand. I made the dog sit whenever he pulled. But the problem is that you have to do this 8,422 times. And I could only do it, well, 10 times before I gave up.

I tried to hire trainers to come and work with Lil Wayne, whom we adopted from the pound and appears to be a Maltipoo, but they all told me that it didn’t do any good to train the dog without my involvement. I still feel that they could teach the dog first and, then, after he grasped the concept, I could take over.

A well-trained dog is a pleasure to be around. A discourteous, willful dog is not. I have a good friend who I’m slightly scared to visit now, because her huge dog always jumps on me and nearly knocks me over. She’s tried to teach him to stop doing it, but he seems to have doggie ADHD.

I have another friend who recently got a large dog, and she’s essentially untrained, under the impression that the house belongs to her and she should be able to run it as she sees fit. (The dog, not my friend.) I’m trying to persuade her now to get a trainer, so I can enjoy the animal, who’s actually quite cute and sweet, when she’s not trying to throw her huge carcass on top of you.

I know that some of you don’t like dogs, so you’re thinking to yourselves: No dog is a pleasure to be around. But dogs are like bratty kids, if they’re not taught to be polite, they’re unbearable. But if they have nice manners, they’re fun.

Don’t get me started on cats. Our last cat, Cairo, a Siamese from the pound who refused to stay indoors, disappeared a couple of months ago. I know I should be heartbroken, but he was aloof and a misogynist who only liked men. The males in my house, including Lil Wayne, were much sadder than I was. Meanwhile, a friend of a friend found an abandoned cat and I was convinced to adopt him. His name is Boris. More on Boris in a future column.

Want to contact me? Hit me up at mfisher@scng.com or join my Facebook page. We have fun on there. facebook.com/FrumpyMiddleagedMom

We’ve now entered the summer travel season, when you can take a package bus tour to Paris. It includes the Louvre museum, so you can be jammed in with 2,000 other art lovers trying to fight your way close enough to glimpse the Mona Lisa, which is much smaller than you’d expect.

Harold is the guy who sits behind you on the motor coach (it’s always called a motor coach, never a bus) and complains constantly that everything’s not exactly like it is back home.

“The sign in the window said they SPEAK ENGLISH,” he says bitterly, when we get back on the bus after our designated time for lunch. “They didn’t speak English.”

This is only one of the 2,402 pithy observations that Harold will make during our journey together through the Great Capitals of Europe. Which I will be forced to hear, because this tour requires you to sit next to the same people the entire time, so they can rotate the seating so everyone eventually gets to sit up front.

During this trip, I will learn that foreign people are smelly, it’s outrageous that you have to bring a coin to tip the bathroom attendant, the food is strange and borderline suspicious, the Roman Colosseum has too many stairs, the Taj Mahal has no air conditioning, the hotel water pressure is substandard, there’s a weird thing in the bathroom that looks like a toilet but it’s not, and Harold is tired of muesli and yogurt for breakfast. I mean, where’s the damn bacon and eggs? What kind of country is this, anyway?

Looking back on my time with Harold, I have to wonder why his wife didn’t just leave him at home and bring her sister instead. But I assume some people are just masochists.

When I was young and just starting to travel on my own, I took package tours, because they knew where they were going and I didn’t.  And I became acquainted with their delightful traditions, like making sure my suitcase was packed and outside my door by 6 a.m. so it could be loaded onto the bus, er, motor coach, so we could head out on our busy itinerary right after breakfast.

We could see three cathedrals before lunch, stopping just long enough to take a photo, then back on the bus for the next one. When we’re finally released from the bus for lunch, we wander around a medieval town looking for a place where we can eat in an hour — meaning we end up at the tourist-oriented restaurants facing the square with the worst food. On the plus side, they’re also the most expensive.

Hey, at least the waiters speak English, and some of them serve chicken fingers. And slices of pizza. That’s definitely what you want in Lyon, widely considered the gourmet capital of France. Slices of pizza. But, not to worry. Later tonight, there will be a special group dinner (optional extra cost) with authentic French cooking and ladies doing the can-can.

No time to linger over a coffee and people watch on the square, because we have to get back on the bus and drive by another cathedral.

Eventually, I outgrew these tours, because I just couldn’t stand to take trips on someone else’s time schedule. Just when you’re starting to have fun somewhere, you have to leave. And I was sick of being shepherded into a gift shop where the only purpose was to earn a commission for the tour company.

I’m not saying I’d never take one again. In 2019, I took an Intrepid Travel tour of India, because I was nervous about visiting such a challenging country by myself. And I’m glad I did, because we had our tour guide available to help us on the sleeper train, when we discovered an entire family had taken over our reserved beds, even to the point of chaining their luggage to the floor. She was able to get the porter to evict them and change the sheets, so we could get some sleep.

She was also kind when I had a meltdown in Varanasi, where the deceased are burnt on funeral pyres on the Ganges River. I just couldn’t take the massive crowds, smells and chaos anymore. I fled back to the hotel, cried, ate pizza and drank a margarita in the American-style lounge. Our guide, Akanksha, then took me with her to a shopping mall, where we saw a Bollywood movie and ate at McDonalds, where they served corn and spinach burgers because cows are sacred. Then I felt better.

But that was Intrepid Travel, which is more my kind of package tour. Meanwhile, I learned that I could make my own arrangements and any hotel will help me find activities and fun things to do. And I could hire my own guides, usually for a similar price to the group trips. Meaning I could do any darn thing I pleased. Thank you, Internet.

And, if I met a Harold, I could just walk past him.

So she decided to become a funeral director, and be around dead people all day. That’s not weird, is it?

Now, let me explain that she’s hardly ever actually been around any dead people, except maybe my dad who died and had an open casket when she was a girl. But somehow she has now decided to make a profession of this, despite her utter and complete lack of knowledge about what she’s getting into. And, yes, I told her to watch “Six Feet Under.” I don’t know if she did.

Let me make it clear that I’m not opposed to Curly Girl choosing this as a career. She could be a star. She loves to talk to people, listen to their problems and comfort them. She does this all day as a bartender, and her customers love her to death. Well, so to speak.

And she knows something about death, even though she’s only 25. I adopted her when she was age 3, but she always wanted to meet her birth father, who abandoned her mother. I later found him online, living in the Simi Valley, where he was a successful tattoo artist. She planned to go introduce herself to him when she was 18.

Unfortunately, he was fatally shot by the police before she got the chance, in what some people called a “suicide by police.” This is apparently not uncommon — you do something so heinous that the cops have to shoot you. Anyway, even though she hadn’t seen her father since she was a baby, she still grieved terribly over her lost opportunity.

Also, even though we live in a middle-class, otherwise boring suburban neighborhood, two of her high school friends died from overdoses, wounding her deeply. This really makes me shake my head, because I didn’t know anyone who died when I was a teenager. Life is harder nowadays for kids, I think.

Anyway, she knows about grief and impromptu counseling, so I think she would be a good funeral director. And she has a weird ghoulish streak, too, that probably attracts her to it as well. (Luckily this doesn’t manifest as any goth makeup or clothing, although she’s got enough piercings that I’m always afraid water will pour out of her when she drinks anything.)

We talked to my acquaintance, Jill Ann Lloyd, who’s a funeral celebrant, also known as a death doula. She thought it sounded like a good idea.

But, back to the OCD issue. (Which stands for Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, for those of who who live in a cave.) She started developing this when she was a teenager, along with panic attacks and anxiety. It’s not terrible, although she always insists on setting the radio volume to an even number and she won’t let her foods touch each other.

I just can’t help thinking that she should actually spend some time around corpses (sorry, I couldn’t immediately think of a more polite word for them. Stiffs?) before she decides to go to school to work with them. I mean, she won’t even shampoo other people’s hair. Don’t you agree? I tried to talk her into getting a job at a funeral home, to test it out before we (meaning me) shell out big bucks for school. But, no, she doesn’t want to. So then, I told her she needs to at the very least job shadow a funeral director for a day, just to make sure she actually likes it. She muttered under her breath about that one, but I hold the purse strings, so we’ll see what happens.

Did I mention that she wants to do most of her schooling online? So, theoretically, she could almost be done with her degree before she even touches a dead body. I just don’t think that’s a good idea.

Online classes would be a good idea, because she has two babies in diapers at home so it would be hard for her to go to class. But what if she finally gets to the embalming class —which you might be stunned to learn must be done in person — and then she’s horrified and can’t do it?

Now, as I’ve told you in the past, my daughter knows infinitely more than I do, so she frequently rolls her eyes and ignores my advice. But this time, she really can’t ignore me, at least not if she wants me to sign checks from her college fund I set up years ago.

Do you agree with me? Do you own a funeral home? Don’t you think she should check it out first? How did you end up in the business? Let me know what you think. I’m at mfisher@scng.com.

But I’m addicted, so I’ll take their places visiting our friendly neighboring countries with their favorable exchange rates. I’ll be eating their $35 lobster dinners at upscale restaurants, drinking their $5 margaritas and buying their $7 real maple syrup. It’s my patriotic duty.

Hey, to get in the mood for this column, I’m looking right now at a photo of the $35 complete dinner I had on my recent birthday near Rosarito Beach, Baja, with grilled lobster tails, fresh flour tortillas still warm from the oven, rice and beans. Yum.

Truthfully, I’ll do pretty much anything for cheap food, which just proves I’m a typical journalist. If you walked into a room filled with boxes of cold pizza that is clearly four days old, while another box holds sad-looking, dried-up doughnuts, and scruffy-looking people are still stopping and grabbing them to eat, you’d obviously wandered into a working newsroom.

In our defense, I will say that we are all paid peanuts, so we live by the motto that bad food is still good food if it’s free. My frequent international travels are all clustered around one theme: Where can Marla eat good food for cheap? In the past, the answer has been Cambodia, Mexico, South Africa, Guatemala, Greece, El Salvador and Morocco. And don’t get me started on Thailand, where we took photos of every meal, so we could remember it to our graves.

People often ask me how to avoid getting sick on foreign travels, and I have a few tips. Be aware that your stomach is not hardened yet to the common foreign bugs, so there is a chance that you’ll get tourist tummy, which is always fun. Nowadays, my insides are cast iron,  so I almost never get sick, although I still take precautions.

A 2020 scientific analysis found that people who took Pepto Bismol daily – morning, noon and night – as a preventative were 3.5 times less likely to get sick – but a new study that just came out contradicted it. I guess you’re on your own with that one.

If I’m in an unfamiliar country, I only eat cooked food. You never know what kind of possibly hinky water was used to wash that lettuce, although fruit that you peel yourself is okay. I cut back on the meat consumption, too. When I’m watching ladies wash their clothes in a river, maybe I don’t want to eat the fish caught there.

But there’s no reason to turn into a paranoid nut job. European countries have a high standard of sanitation. You don’t need to skip the salad in Paris, and you can drink the water just fine, although they want to sell you those expensive water bottles instead.

In any country, if you’re in a nice restaurant surrounded by tourists, just relax. If they routinely killed their diners, they wouldn’t have a business left. A place like that almost certainly has filters on its kitchen water taps, making it safe. In fact, many nicer houses have water filters in the kitchens as well. And, yes, you can put an ice cube in your cocktail.

If your tummy does get upset, here’s what I do: My acupuncturist taught me something he learned while studying Traditional Chinese Medicine in China. Po Chai Pills from Hong Kong. I carry them everywhere I go, and pop a tiny bottle when I start feeling even a little queasy. Obviously, I’m not a doctor, so you can take my personal experience for what it’s worth. Although I will point out, it has been used by doctors in China for a long time.

I seldom eat at street stands, even when my friends are munching away. If I do, I make sure the food is cooked right in front of me, and there’s a long line of diners attesting to its freshness. And I wonder about refrigeration.

Food in Canada, our neighbor to the north, isn’t necessarily cheap, but that favorable exchange rate is our friend. And there’s one thing I always buy: Maple syrup. If you’ve never had pure Canadian maple syrup from Quebec, get up and go immediately to the grocery store. Yes, you’ll be shocked at the price, but then you’ll taste it and go into a swoon. You’ll never think about our maple-flavored corn syrup the same way again.

I’m going to visit friends in Toronto in August, and guess what I’ll be bringing home? Yup. Maple syrup. And then I’ll hide it from my kids.

There are two of you now, although you’re both in diapers and haven’t yet learned how to read. Hopefully, by the time you’re old enough, people will still be reading and this skill hasn’t been replaced by something else, like viewing everything on screens. (Although, to be honest, I read mostly on screens these days.)

Anyway, I never know when a bus might jump a lane and mow me down, or a giant bird might come down from the sky and carry me away to his hilltop nest, so I figured I’d do my best to give you my 69 years of wisdom now, at least as much of it as can fit into this column. Your mother never followed much of my wisdom, and she’s still paying the price for this, but you should be glad, because one of my bits of wise advice was: “Don’t have two babies in diapers at the same time.”

Luckily for you, beautiful beings, she ignored me, as she usually does, because she’s still at the age where she knows more than I do. But you’re also lucky that she’s a deeply devoted mother who adores you more than life itself, and would happily throw herself in front of a train for either one of you. Fortunately, there aren’t that many trains around these days, so that probably won’t happen. But I adopted your mother when she was three years old, and I still remember the exact moment that I realized the same thing, and that’s when I knew we were a family.

We live in earthquake country. Hopefully, the Big One won’t hit while you’re around, but there are a few simple ways to be prepared that won’t be difficult. First of all, the quake is going to knock down all the power lines. This means that you won’t have any, gasp, electricity. I still remember this vividly from the 1994 Northridge Earthquake. The gas pumps won’t work, and if you don’t have any gas in your car, you can’t get in it and drive out of the hellhole zone. So keep gas in your car all the time, when you’re old enough to drive, of course. Don’t be one of those idiots who always waits until it’s on fumes to fill up. This may make you roll your eyes – when you acquire this skill -– but I was in Zion National Park once when a freak snowstorm knocked out all the power, and we were stuck in an unheated motel for two days because we didn’t have enough gas to drive to the next town, many miles away. And, most importantly, you won’t have any way to charge your phone – assuming the phone towers work – if your car is out of gas.

Also, keep some cash around for emergencies. Remember cash? When the power goes out, the ATM won’t work, the bank will close and the credit card machines will be out of action. No one will extend you credit when you’re trying to buy candles and flashlights. Trust me, I know this from experience. This is the sort of thing that young people think will never happen to them, but remember the maxim: An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. If the country has finally moved to using grams and kilograms, this will be confusing, but you get the drift.

You don’t have to keep peanut butter in the fridge. In fact, it gets hard and yucky if you do. Never put honey in there either because it crystallizes. Wash fresh egg off any dish you use immediately before it dries into granite. Never park your car (or tricycle) under a jacaranda tree in bloom. Right now, I’m looking out the window at your uncle’s car, which is on the street and covered with beautiful purple blossoms. I told him yesterday he should move it, but he’s also at the age where he knows better. Jacaranda blossoms have a sticky sap that will eat the paint job on any vehicle you park under it, which is one amusing way to tell if people are new to Southern California. Veterans know better, unless they’re my son.

Don’t get a big dog. This is another piece of advice that your mother ignored and came to regret. Big dogs have big massive giant poops and need big, heavy, expensive bags of food. They knock people over jumping on them and their tails can be lethal weapons. Nowadays, small dogs are welcome almost everywhere, even places that are inappropriate, like grocery stores. They also have small dainty poops, and won’t drag you behind when you walk them. Sorry, Beethoven. I’ve had a St. Bernard and you also slobber everywhere. But I like your movies.

And, finally, always be nice to your Nana. That’s me. And, no, I’m not grandma. Grandmothers are old. I’m only 69, so I’m not officially old yet, even if the government thinks I am. Though I don’t turn down those senior discounts. And I’m way better than your other grandma. Just remember that. I’m the one who started your college savings account. And paid for your passport when you were six months old. You’ll thank me later. Hopefully, the giant bird will drop me, so you can do it in person.

After each course, one of the chefs is eliminated by a panel of expert judges, until finally the winner gets a cash prize. And bragging rights of course. Occasionally, producers will mix it up, like using whiz kid chefs, or grannies with amazing skills and even celebrities. But, generally, the chefs are seasoned professionals.

And the mystery ingredients for them always include stuff that’s darn weird to most of us, like 100-year-old eggs from China, which for your edification aren’t really that old, but they are stinky and rotten. Other possibilities in that little basket, according to Mashed.com, could include fried rattlesnake, Rocky Mountain oysters, aka bull testicles, durian — a fruit popular in Southeast Asia which is known for its terrible aroma, balut — a partly developed duck embryo inside a shell, chicken feet, complete with tiny toenails, reindeer pate and a goat head (fortunately, already skinned.)

The competitors are expected to repurpose the mystery ingredients. So if they get fiddlehead ferns, they can’t just cook them as is. That’s almost considered cheating. They have to make fiddlehead fern ice cream or grind them into a veggie pate. Occasionally, you’ll see a contestant just take a Hawaiian sweet roll and heat it up to serve and you can’t help shaking your head with disbelief, knowing this poor sod is about to get his head ripped off by the judges, who aren’t always kind.

The reason this show helped me learn to cook is that you actually watch the process occur, with the chefs going to the pantry against the clock to look for sugar, for example, and not finding any. So they grab maple syrup instead — because it’s also sweet — to prepare the dish they just invented on the spot. Or maybe they realize their dish is too sweet, so they grab something sour or salty to balance it out.

Watching this show taught me how to use flavors in dishes, and also how to use what I already have in my kitchen, rather than running to the store.

And, as TV, it’s a heck of a lot more exciting than just watching your average cooking show.  You find yourself sighing in disgust when you see someone make a rookie error, like putting raw onions in a salad, because some judges hate raw onions. Or grabbing the “truffle oil” and adding it at the last minute, which is a legendary mistake that always backfires. I have no idea what truffle oil tastes like, but I guarantee you that if I’m ever on “Chopped,” I definitely won’t use any. It always sends the judges into a froth.

There are student cooking competitions around the country that also use the mystery basket format. I covered one at Orange Coast College in Costa Mesa, which has a well-known culinary arts program. The students were competing against an out-of-town school, and the judge was a tall, refined Austrian gentleman who was the executive chef at one of the fancy schmancy hotels nearby.

It was fun to watch,  and the home team won. I’d gone to write a feature about the event for the paper even though I had a bad cold that day. After the win, I sat down with the elegant-but-not-snooty chef from Austria, who was wearing a tall white chef’s hat and a number of decorations I didn’t recognize, but I assumed meant that he was a muckety-muck of some high standing in the culinary world. We sat across from each other at a table with a linen tablecloth and I started asking him questions, notebook in hand.

I popped a cough drop into my mouth, to keep from hacking away. But, at one point, I still had a fit of coughing and the cough drop flew out of my mouth and landed on the tablecloth in front of us. We both just looked silently at the cough drop lying there. My face started turning red. We looked at each other, then we looked at the cough drop. Twice. Finally, I just grabbed the cough drop, popped it back in my mouth, told him,  “You didn’t see that,” and kept on with the interview. It was never mentioned again.

FYI: “Chopped” airs Tuesday nights on the Food Network and also streams on Max, Discovery+ and Food Network Go.

And being untidy is considered a personal failing in our culture, a breach of the moral code. A good, upstanding person would have a clean, organized house that is soothing to the eyes when you walk into it. No piles of clutter. No junk all over the dining room table. No giant boxes of Costco finds that you have nowhere to put, so they’re shoved into a corner. But–and I admit this sadly — that’s not me.

I have in the past tried to turn over a new leaf and become orderly, ferociously going through my house and decluttering, cleaning out closets so things can actually be stored in there —other than three Frisbees (when no one in our house plays Frisbee.)

But here’s the rub: When I start cleaning all the junk off the dining room table, for example, fantasizing about some future day when it could theoretically again be used for … dining … I invariably find something that needs to be put away in my bathroom. Say, a Costco purchase that never made it off the table, where it landed when I got home from shopping. So, I take it into the bathroom, but while I’m there, I notice that none of the cleaning supplies have been put away. They’re still on the counter of the sink. Messy messy messy. So I open the bottom cabinet and start putting those away, and realize how messy that cabinet is, so I start organizing it so that there’s room to store the cleaning supplies.

I know you’re highly intelligent people, since you’re reading my column, so you clearly foresee the end of this process. That’s right. By the end of the day, various things have been straightened up around the house invisibly, but the dining room table is still covered with clutter.

After this happens a few times, it’s easy to just fall into a pit of existential despair. I decide that eating in the dining room is really just a bourgeois habit, and it’s so much more fun to eat on the living room couch.

Right now, my table is covered with the leftover detritus of a Christmas-ornament making party I had — that’s right, before Christmas. And, yes, five months later, it’s still there. But, wait, I can explain. I also got my rubber stamp collection out of the cupboard, along with paper and envelopes, and started making greeting cards on it. This is really fun. It requires a lot of stuff, like marking pens, paint, heavyweight paper, envelopes, decorations and such.

I keep trying to put all this away. In fact, I just bought a new plastic bin the size of a 1957 Buick to store it. But every time I start loading everything into it — the stamps, the ink pads, the paint, the markers, the paper, the envelopes, the glue, the containers of glitter, the tiny stars, well, I could keep on going but you get the drift — I realize that someone’s birthday is coming up, so I sit down and make them a card. When I finish doing that, I look up and address the card, find a stamp and put it out by the mailbox, Then, I realize I’m late for yet another doctor’s appointment.

So, yet again, the stuff doesn’t get stored away. I really miss having a craft room, where you can make a huge mess and then just shut the door on it. I haven’t had one of those since I adopted my kids in 2002. Gee. 23 years ago.

Some of you are making a disgusted face right now. I can see you. You’re thinking to yourself, “You’re just making excuses for being a slob. It’s not that hard to be clean.”

Well, yes, but here are my excuses: I don’t consider myself dirty. Messy, yes. But I don’t leave dirty dishes lying around, and I use the trash can consistently. Things that fall on the floor (usually) don’t remain there. Our dog, Lil Wayne, helps with that. My housekeeper Dora comes every week to do the heavy cleaning, mopping the floors, washing clothes, well, you know.

Now, I have to tell you that I’ve been a newspaper reporter for 45 years, and I’ve been inside countless homes of strangers. And, you know what? They’re usually rather messy, unless they’ve been straightened up for my arrival. That’s just the way people live. I’ve been in the home of a woman who still had a very dusty Christmas tree up in July, for example. Did I judge her? No, I did not. So please don’t judge me.

However, when your clutter is preventing you from doing things you like, such as entertaining, then it is time to take action. This is what I’m telling myself. The best way I’ve found to clean up your house is to schedule an event there, like maybe an audience with the Pope. Then, you will race around and clean it up, so people won’t know what a slob you really are. That’s what I need to do. Are you available Aug. 24? I think that’s when I can be ready.

As in, “If you’re on time, you’re late. If you’re early, you’re on time.”

But I’m not perfect,  and this particular night, I didn’t even have an excuse to be late, because I started getting ready early. I was standing in my bathroom, trying to make the agonizing decision of which color of lipstick to wear, when I looked at the clock. Yikes! It had somehow mysteriously jumped ahead by 20 minutes. So now I was going to be late picking up not one, but two sets of friends.

Everyone knows someone who’s perennially late and you usually just start planning around it. To avoid frustration, I now tell one particularly good friend that any event starts an hour earlier than it really does, so we can get there on time.

But if someone’s on time sometimes, and sometimes late, it makes it hard to know how to plan. Do you have time to make a pitcher of ice tea? Or should you be standing in the front yard, waiting for them to pull up?

It’s so much easier now with mobile phones, of course, because you can get updates. “I’ll be there as soon as I can, the traffic is heavy,” one friend used to message me half an hour after we were supposed to get together, even though the traffic is always heavy from her house. Apparently it never occurred to her to leave earlier to compensate for it. But, again, since I knew she’d always be late, I knew I had time to go out back and water the plants.

But I could never really understand why I would end up being late on the days when I started getting ready so early. Especially because I’m a very low maintenance gal. I seldom wear any makeup except lipstick, my hair is done when I’ve run a comb through it, and my clothes tend more toward comfort and ease of use than style.

If necessary, I can be ready for the Apocalypse, a hike in Joshua Tree, a night at the opera or dinner at the White House within five minutes’ time.

But here’s my epiphany: I realize I’m always late when I start getting ready too early. With no sense of haste, I dawdle over every task. Hmm, should I wear my shawl or my sweater? Do I need a sweater at all? Well, it never hurts to bring one. The classic mother’s motto: Better to have it and not need it than need it and not have it.

I think I’ll grab a Pellegrino water out of the fridge in case I get thirsty. Oh, wait. I didn’t feed the cat yet. Where is he? Stupid cat. Why can’t he be waiting patiently for his dinner, like the dog? Speaking of which, I haven’t fed the dog either. Well, they’ll just have to wait until I get home.

Maybe I should wear my watch. But where did I leave it? Oh. I just remembered. I left some chicken in the Instant Pot. I need to put it in Tupperware and in the fridge before it spoils. Well, here’s the Tupperware, but where’s the lid? Why is that stupid lid always missing? Why do I have 437 lids but none of them fit anything? I don’t have time now to find it. I’ll just cover it with aluminum foil.  Hmm, maybe I should bring some snacks to share for intermission. Let’s see what I have in the cupboard.

HOLY CRAPOLA! I just looked at the clock. How did that happen? I’m supposed to be there right now! And so now I’m late! I’ll run into my room, put on my shoes and grab my purse. But, wait! Where’s my phone? I can’t go without my phone? Where’s my son? He can call my phone for me. Maybe it fell down underneath my chair. But it’s dark down there. I’d better turn on my flashlight and look for it.

Hmm, still can’t find it, even with the flashlight. Oh. Wait. I’m using the flashlight on my phone to look for my phone.That’s embarrassing. Luckily, no one’s here to see.

Now, I know not to start getting ready too early. It will make me late.

In case you didn’t know, other countries also have their own versions of this holiday, the international retail bonanza to sell greeting cards, flowers, stuffed animals and such to people in foreign countries. For example, the French celebrate on the last Sunday in May. Probably with wine.

I once went to a Mother’s Day mass at a big church in Mexico devoted to the Virgin Mary on the Mexican Mother’s Day — which is always on May 10 — and it was so crowded I accidentally got shoved into the old wooden confessional booth. It was nice and roomy in there, so I stayed put until after the mass was over. Luckily for me, there was no priest in there with me, so I didn’t have to confess anything.

I went into my local Stater Bros. market last night and it looked like the Carlsbad Flower Fields in there. About 30 acres of floral tributes they hope you’ll buy for Mom. I couldn’t help thinking that some of them will be wilted by Sunday.

My late mother was not only practical but extremely frugal, so the one time I persuaded my dad to make an unusual romantic gesture and buy her long-stemmed roses for the big day, she became enraged and chewed him out for “wasting all that money.” Ooops. Guess that didn’t go so well.

Since they were small, I taught my children that they must give me a gift on Mother’s Day, even if they made it themselves. I trained them in this regard because I had a couple of friends who bemoaned every year that their kids ignored them on the holiday. But, seriously, what did they expect if they didn’t use pedagogical guilt to train them properly?

I’m really lousy at using guilt to manipulate my kids, I’m sad to say. I don’t know why. I try to copy my friends who’ve mastered the art, but my kids just laugh at me and tell me to cut it out. For some reason, I’m just not convincing enough. If you have any tips for me, let me know.

But I was already an old mom when I adopted my kids at age 46, so I was fairly ferocious when it came to teaching them. Like, you are required to give your mother a gift and show appreciation on Mother’s Day, even when it means burnt toast crumbs in bed and a big mess in the kitchen.

I have pointed out to them that the only Mother’s Day gifts I’ve carefully put away in a drawer are the cards and letters they made themselves.

Things are a tad different around our house these days, because my beautiful daughter, Curly Girl, is now a mother herself. She has two babies in diapers and wonders why she’s tired all the time. It’s a mystery. So we celebrate not one but two Mother’s Days. I’m assigned to figure this out. Last year, we had brunch on my back deck, which was nice, and we didn’t have to pay $99 per person to eat at some fancy restaurant, or get into fistfights waiting in line somewhere else. When I have to wait at these types of places, I always wish I had a taser.

Seriously. $99 per person. Would you pay that? It just seems nuts to me, especially since my daughter eats like a sparrow and I’m always on a diet. But, then, I’m a cheapskate. What are they serving? Truffles and Russian caviar?

Actually the fancy Castaway restaurant in Burbank is $105 per person, and that doesn’t even include mimosas, tax or tip. But the Father’s Day brunch is only $98. (Explain that one to me.) Interestingly, the also-fancy Luminarias restaurant in Monterey Park, which is owned by the same company, seems to have a similar menu but is a mere $80 per person. Such a deal!

In Riverside, you can go to a “grand” Mother’s Day brunch at the swanky Mission Inn for $116.15 that seems to include live entertainment.  And you have to pay in advance. Well, actually, you could have gone but it seems to already be sold out. So sorry. I hear Denny’s is still available.

Whatever you do today, I hope it’s a good day for you. Come back next week for more yammering about nothing.