Men should do housework because it needs to be done not because they're earning a reward.
Ladies, when you've finished cooking dinner, washing the dishes, folding the laundry and sweeping the floors, what kind of reward do you receive from your husband? A kiss? A foot massage? A week-long getaway with your girlfriends? Wait, you don't receive any of those things? That's what we thought. But, despite the fact that women do the housework with no promise of praise upon completion, an Australian news host has proposed an incentive program to encourage men to chip in around the house.
A guy who hasn't lived with roommates for 10 years moves in with his tidy girlfriend.
Following several years of barely-restrained, insouciant bachelorhood, I'm finally preparing my first move-in with a girlfriend. I've lived alone for years, roommate- and drama-free just as I like it. I haven't had a roommate since my sophomore year of college over 10 years ago, and the only beef either of us ever had with one another was when he woke up from a nap to find I killed his bag of Better Made Red Hot potato chips.
That he's great at romance but is slow to help with housework doesn't reflect his feelings for you.
In a new relationship, every kiss or cuddle is appreciated, cooed over, and dissected with girlfriends over brunch. But as time wears on, many of us begin to take small romantic gestures for granted, and instead focus on whether or not our partner is capable of ongoing thoughtful behavior. Does he call back when he said he would? Does he do household chores without being nagged? Does he put the toilet seat down? And if he doesn't, why not? "It's not that much effort!" we think. "Wouldn't he make it a priority to do those things if he really loved me?" Apparently, in some cases, the answer is "No."
If he won't do the chores, offer him a blow job, says a married female GQ writer.
Almost every cohabiting couple fights about household chores. When faced with a dirty sink, most of us will resort to one of two things: nagging our guy until he gives in, or doing it ourselves even though it's definitely not our turn. Unless you're naturally generous, the latter usually leads to resentment, which is why Kelly Oxford, a writer for GQ magazine, suggests that women offer men sexual favors in exchange for doing the chores.
Does doing the dishes count as an act of love or a simple life responsibility?
Do you think you're doing your spouse a great act of love when you do the laundry or take out the trash? I would challenge you to rethink that. Responsibilities of life are different than really loving your spouse. So what is love really? Read on to find out.
New trends in the American family: surprising facts about marriage, divorce and kids today.
It goes without saying that we no longer live in the time of the Huxtables (much less the Cleavers). But what makes families today different from how they used to be? We decided to investigate. Using facts from census data and recent studies on child-rearing, work, and marriage, we've narrowed down seven qualities that characterize the new American family.
Dancing out a fight and more oddly wise, happy couple tricks to maintain your relationship.
Every now and then, we browse Metafilter, a huge community questionboard, to stave off our boredom. When we came across a board titled, What Clever Relationship Hacks Have You Come Up With?, we couldn't help but be grateful that we learned something in the process of passing the afternoon hours. To clarify, by "relationship hacks," the original poster meant clever or unconventional ways to maintain a healthy relationship. Since the forum received so much feedback, we've narrowed down eight of the funniest and presumably wisest relationship tips from real-life couples from around the web. Let us know in the comments whether or not you agree with these:
As part of his book, The Guinea Pig Diaries, author A.J. Jacobs did everything his wife told him to.
As part of his book, The Guinea Pig Diaries, author A.J. Jacobs did everything his wife told him to. "She will be boss. I will be her devoted servant. It will be a month of foot massages and talking about feelings and scrubbing dishes and watching Kate Hudson movies (well, if Julie actually liked Kate Hudson movies). It could be revelatory. It'll let me explore the tricky power dynamics of the modern American marriage. It'll allow me to study the Mars/Venus, Everybody Loves Raymond clichés about gender battles and figure out which are true and which are hogwash."
When he says, "I had a bad day," do you say, "Mine was worse"?
When your spouse comes home from work and tells you his boss yelled at him in front of three colleagues, do you one-up him with tales of the client who reamed you out in a meeting—and later spilled his coffee on your shirt? If this sounds familiar you may be getting sucked into "misery poker." In a new relationship-focused Wall Street Journal column called Bonds, author Elizabeth Bernstein explores the phenomenon of funereal one-upmanship: trying to outdo each other with tales of woe.
Advice on how to divide housework. First tip? Get him to do man chores!
According to Simon Oaks, author of Will Marry for Food, Sex and Laundry, men aren't wired for certain chores. He cites the (made-up) proverb: "Give a man a clean kitchen and he'll make a mess of the place after one meal. Teach a man to clean a kitchen and you'll probably have to clean up after him anyway." So how do you handle housework when one of you is a repeat pleaning offender? Oaks devotes a whole chapter of his book to this; here are a few highlights.
