I am going to disagree, because this isn't just about this woman and her husband, this is about a general cultural problem in which women are perceived to be in charge of housework, even when they have full time jobs.

I'm not talking about SAH's, obviously if your job is to stay at home to take care of the house that is what you do.

I'm talking about women who work full time being the default household manager.

Got too many friends in that situation, who have to come home and work second shift while their husbands don't do shit until they are nagged, and even then they may not.

And before someone says, "It's because women have crazy high standards", these are not crazy neat freaks. This is the basics... laundry, making the kids do homework, getting food on the table... this isn't dusting behind the refrigerator.

And even for the women who HAVE the crazy standards, the reality is if a house looks like crap it's the woman going to be judged, scolded by in-laws, etc.

This is a society-wide problem.

Women are expected to do two jobs and it just isn't realistic. If men want a woman to do it all then they need to be prepared to earn all the money and have her do it. If they want her to be in charge with them pitching in occasionally, she needs to be working only part time. If they want the extra pleasures money can bring with a spouse who works full time, they need to be 50% responsible.

I am going to disagree, because this isn't just about this woman and her husband, this is about a general cultural problem in which women are perceived to be in charge of housework, even when they have full time jobs.

If working women in a two-person relationship are "perceived" as being in charge of housework, they need to tighten that up tuit suite before they end up in tears because their dude has left a box out of the closet.

As for "emotional labor" (snort), who asked you to perform it, my dear?

I am going to disagree, because this isn't just about this woman and her husband, this is about a general cultural problem in which women are perceived to be in charge of housework, even when they have full time jobs.

If working women in a two-person relationship are "perceived" as being in charge of housework, they need to tighten that up tuit suite before they end up in tears because their dude has left a box out of the closet.

As for "emotional labor" (snort), who asked you to perform it, my dear?

If it was an individual, yes. This is a society-wide problem.

"This is a society-wide problem."

So is mopery with intent to loiter, but nobody does anything about it.

We must live in different societies NicoleK. Where I live this is typical feminine whining about nothing all so they can justify their poor behavior. The guy needs to get a divorce attorney. As she said she controls the money and she is clearly emotionally abusive. It is only a question of time for when she will divorce him. He needs to prepare for the inevitable and protect himself as much as possible.

"Women Aren't Nags..." written by a woman who proves beyond all doubt that she's a nag.

Ye gods, it's the Queen of Karens! Feigned helplessness, excuses, projection, entitlement, all in one glorious bundle.

And if she finds calling for quotes to be "emotional labor," she has no one to blame but herself. If you're a doormat, calling for quotes will result in listening to some tiresome sales pitch. However, if you remember you're the customer and calling the shots, you simply interject, "Excuse me, but I'm just looking for quotes right now. If I find your rates reasonable, I will get back to you."

Yeah, the writer is a piece of work but her husband is having serious adulting problems. He can't be bothered to get her the gift she wants, he wants her to get her own gift? He can't be bothered to throw his dirty socks on the laundry pile?

Shhh! They'll revoke your womanhood card!

This wasn’t about housecleaning as the woman freely admits. It was about her deciding that what she wanted was for her husband to magically become her so she could take a break and be him.

My husband is also terrible at these sorts of things. So, until the kids were old enough to take over some of the household work, errands and driving, I didn’t work outside the home, Because I didn’t want to have three jobs.

My husband is wonderful at doing what I ask, but the request has to be simple and short term. Like for example, “Would you please clean the toilet in the second bathroom, we have company coming” Men tend to be short term thinkers. It is unfair to ask my husband to remember to do something two weeks after I ask him. I’m not into playing gotcha games with him, when he forgets something. He does not exist to be my office boy, and I am not writing him performance reports, with an end goal of replacing him with someone more efficient.

The woman LITERALLY SAID she wanted a professional to come clean. Where's the mind reader in that? Hire a professional!

It's like if she said she wanted to go to a restaurant and he called one last minute and said, "It cost 150 per person so I'm going to cook instead, just tell me what to do and how to do it."

This gal must not have much seniority in her day job - or she'd know sumthin about delegation.

In both corporate management and parenting courses, i was taught to frame the result and let the delegatee do things as they wished.

That's not what this catty narcissist wants.

Nicole and other whiners: marriage means living with someone different from you in their interests and priorities. Without making them over in your image.

I am sure men on average care less about the home then women on average. Just like men's reasons for getting married and criteria for mate selection are diffferent from women's. And their parenting styles. Etc.

The Goddess has documented lotsa this... And regularly takes swings at feminist denial of biological, cognitive, developmental differences between the sexes. And regularly rags on the "women earn less" lie, which is a siamese twin of the "2nd shift" lie.

So this blog aint exactly the place to dredge up hoary feminist set pieces about women being victimized by men's shocking lack of femininity.

The husband does need to step up. Like most men of a certain age, he's been taught that housework is for the wife and yard work for the husband.

Notice, we're not told in this complaint if the husband is busting his hump on weekends with yard work and home projects. Nor are we told if his job entails sitting in an office where he could phone several house cleaning services or if it's manual labor where getting a few minutes to phone several services can be difficult.

She wanted the royal treatment - and that's not to say she isn't entitled to it once in a while. We all are. No wife wants to be an afterthought to her husband.

The wife, in this case, is not making her expectations clear. She needs to sit down with her husband and go over what each of them can do. He needs to understand his wife is frustrated - perhaps not really by him, but he needs to find and help her with the underlying cause of her frustration.

Marriage isn't just two people in lust for each other having a permanent hook-up. It's two people merging all aspects of their lives, the exciting and the mundane.

If they don't coordinate their expectations, they're going to end up divorced. This is on both of them to fix. And after the divorce, she'll claim he emotionally abandoned her and he'll have been blindsided by the divorce.

Though it does occur to me that people with no experience hiring help might not know things like agencies charge way more and pay the cleaners way less, so it's better to ask a friend because odds are your friends hire freelancers, who charge less and keep everything.

Yeah, the writer is a piece of work but her husband is having serious adulting problems.

Unless this was an arranged marriage and she never met the fellow before saying "I do", she chose this dude and knew or should have known what she was getting.

There are two fallacies in long term relationships:

Men: expect their woman to never change.
Women: expect their man to change, in a way that is pleasing to her.

Neither are reasonable, and are a recipe of trouble. Don't get me started with the situation were a person demands the other to change.

As for the wider subject at hand:

Did you ask him?
Did he do it?
Did you tell him he did it wrong?

If a thing must be done to a specific standard or method, then you must provide the requisite instruction before hand.

I suspect there is a lot of relevant and material information that is missing from the story. I would really like to know the perspective of the husband.

I once made an unwoke comment regarding the allocation of household duties with my wife. I was immediately taken to task. I responded that my wife, with my support, elected to be a stay at home mother. (We believe children should have a 24 hour parent). I told my critics that if my wife wanted to go work outside the home we would renegotiate.

Honestly I think the real issue is she makes more money and has control of the budget. Her unrealistic expectation for men and women to be exactly the same is pretty normal. But the very vast majority of women are hypergamous. They need to look up to their partner to be happy. Well, people are people and men aren't significantly better than women. So you need something other than base reality to fill those needs. The destructive way is to tear the female partner down. Which is why so many women stay in bad relationships. It isn't a good solution but it is an effective one. Another option is to have male mystique. People in general tend to mythologize things they don't know how to do, no matter how simple the task is. Hence the historical societal trend to men's work and women's work. Women will devalue what they are doing and overvalue what men are doing satisfying their hypergamous tendencies and leading to a happier relationship.

The gift, for me, was not so much in the cleaning itself but the fact that for once I would not be in charge of the household office work.

I had wanted to hire out deep cleaning for a while, especially since my freelance work had picked up considerably.

Disappointed by my unwavering desire, the day before Mother's Day he called a single service, decided they were too expensive, and vowed to clean the bathrooms himself.

With her increased workload she's feeling overwhelmed. She wanted him to take the responsibility for the cleaning so she could free her mind from it. He thought she just wanted a laborer, so he offered himself.

"Disappointed by my unwavering desire"

She left out "heaving bosom", "chestnut-haired beauty", "broad-shouldered field hand with the intellect of a senior adjunct professor of the humanities", and "moist".

"since I control the budget"

Well, that's the problem right there. You're controlling the wrong thing. You need to control the budgie.

Good one, Gog. If "Unwavering Desire" is not already the name of a romance novel, it should be.

Sorry, I'm just wondering when posting on Facebook became "emotional labor"? Also, if we are starting with the premise that all men are stupid about household issues, who among his FB friends was going to have the answers she was seeking? My husband is very smart, but neither he, or his male colleagues, is likely to have anything worthwhile to say on the topic of cheap house cleaners. Those are references which usually come via word of mouth (and every woman already knows this). Failing word of mouth resources, I would do as he did, and call a service. Seems to me the whole thing was a setup that he was meant to fail so that she could write this piece of feminist twaddle.

I'm sure her cats will be very loyal to her once he's gone and she can be "free" of the "emotional labor" he creates for her.

"I had wanted to hire out deep cleaning for a while, especially since my freelance work had picked up considerably." " I knew exactly how exhausting it was going to be. " "He told me the high dollar amount of completing the cleaning services I requested (since I control the budget) and asked incredulously if I still wanted him to book it."

She cannot manage herself, but she pretends she can manage a household. Her mistake was setting up a mother-child relationship. She should have just been a wife. She thought she wanted to be the boss, and that it was all going to be "Girl Boss" coffee mugs and blotto brunch.

Hopefully Corona-Chan and the great cessation gives her some perspective.

I think the wife is sexist. Men in general are not wired to notice little things the way women are. They just don't "see" the mess the same way women do. There's research confirming this: College guinea pigs--I mean, students--were left ostensibly to wait for a while in a room with a desk that had many items scattered on top. When later asked, the women could remember at least twice as many items on the desk as the men.
Our spouse/life partner's job is not to make our life perfect or to be some ideal roommate whose methods of maintaining shared space are a mirror of our own. They are people with just as much right to their own space and attitudes as we have.

This woman's problem is that she married a man and can't understand why he doesn't act like a woman.

Thanks, NicoleK.

Leaving aside Gemma Hartley's case...

I hope and pray that if nothing else, the coronavirus scare will get adult slobs, male and female alike, to understand that just as you have to wash your hands several times a day, even BEFORE this crisis, you simply cannot postpone all the time-consuming indoor cleaning chores either just because you, personally, don't see or smell anything bad. As in: No, you can't leave dishes in the sink for hours; no, you can't dust and vacuum only once a month - usually. (Little kids may think adults are crazy and stupid to worry about things they can't even see without a microscope - and mean and unfair to force kids to clean every day - but we expect them to take our word on it, don't we? What's the difference with adults?)

My point is that if a sloppy adult really believes that it's the neat spouse/roommate who needs to change his/her standards, chances are that is completely wrong. After all, it takes just one plastic bag or glossy magazine on the floor to result in a broken leg, and just because any guests you have over may be too polite to say anything, doesn't mean they aren't offended by what they can see and smell.

And it's VERY wrong for any adult who likes a reasonably clean house to act as though the other adult should do most of the time-consuming work just because "you don't hate it as much as I do." When you were little, you wouldn't have tolerated that argument from an older sibling who didn't even offer to pay you for it - and chances are, your parents wouldn't have allowed it either. So what's the difference when you're grown up? Stealing other people's leisure time is just plain wrong. A kid might just as well argue to a sibling: "You don't hate book reports the way I do, so YOU'RE going to do my book reports for me." If one can understand why it's rotten and wrong to do that to a roommate or one's co-workers, what's the difference when it comes to a spouse?

I'd also love to know just how many sloppy roommates or spouses were RAISED to be truly considerate of others but did a 180-turn once they left home. Somehow, I doubt most slobs were raised that way.

Finally:

"35 bad home habits you need to stop right now":

https://www.loveproperty.com/gallerylist/93582/35-bad-home-habits-you-need-to-stop-right-now

Just in case anyone got the wrong idea - the article is NOT gender-specific.

I also think that men and women alike should be thrifty, if only because even two happy spendthrifts will likely run out of money one day and grow angry and resentful toward each other. Just because both parties in a couple may hate cooking and cleaning, chances are they can't really afford to eat take-out for every meal AND have a weekly cleaner, so they both need to do their share of chores.

But there should be limits. That is, neither men or women should not have to do seriously dangerous jobs they are not trained to do, such as roof repair, just to save money.

Also, even an exhausting task that lasts 30 minutes is not a "day's work," so it's unfair to act as though it IS equal to the unpaid six hours or so that one's spouse does.

(No, homemakers can't do more than three chores at a time, if that, on average. Especially if there are small children to look after. Machines can only do so much. So don't assume every homemaker could get everything done in 30 hours per week.)

Whoops - I meant "neither men or women should have to do seriously dangerous jobs," of course.

Not to mention that I doubt the average woman would rather dust and vacuum Every Day than have the time and energy for sex, even with an enthusiastic cleaning partner. So when two adults truly WORK together on chores, it shouldn't be too hard for them to figure out how to get them done without either cutting corners or overdoing it. What man wouldn't be happy with a partner who always has time and energy in bed?

That is a sad relationship.

"The clean house would simply be a bonus."

Ha! I would have thought the clean house was the goal!

That someone (gender does not matter) expects something to be done his/her way not caring that the end goal has been met has problems that are self inflicted.

If this was a PA website, they would be (rightly) calling this a shit test.

It doesn't appear to work that way Lenona. If the man vacuums half the carpets and the woman vacuums the other half she is going to file for divorce. Which is stupid but life is often stupid.

I remember reading an article a while back highlighting a study in which women resented husbands who were good at traditionally feminine tasks. It centered on childcare and working women who resented their SAH husbands for having more time with the children and for being better at child-raising than they were.

The women went on to talk about how much stress they felt about being the sole breadwinner and how they resented not being able to take a job that satisfied because they had to take one that paid.

Many of them reported by less sexually-attracted to their husbands in those role-reversals and a large portion admitted considering divorce.

In all, men don't win when they take over the domestic role.

Ben, would you please explain? Aside from the fact that I never suggested such bean-counting as what you described, you didn't even explain why the divorce would happen. (And Conan's example, above, was about SAH husbands, who are hardly the norm anyway - and it wasn't even clear just how often that arrangement doesn't work out.)

In theory, it would make sense for both adults to divide the chores according to who hates which chore the less. The trouble, of course, happens when one spouse loathes ALL the chores - except maybe one weekly chore, like mowing the lawn - and who, like a child, thinks that "I don't feel like it" is practically a medical excuse to shirk, when it's really just an attitude that needs to be outgrown. (To a kid, one might say "pretend it's fun. Make a game out of it!") The other problem is that even when the above is not the case, when you only do the chores you "like," it's too easy to lose perspective - sort of like the child who has nothing to do on school vacation and gets bored. Plus the fact that when your spouse is ill or unavailable, that means you will suddenly have to do important work that you never learned to do - and doing it badly just might be disastrous, depending on the chore.

See here for a classic, very old, fictional example - "The Husband Who Was to Mind the House":

https://www.pitt.edu/~dash/norway010.html

Btw, when it comes to kids, at least, I don't know why more people don't do what John Rosemond recommends - simply exchange chores every four months or until everyone has learned to do a set of chores to perfection, whichever comes second. NOT every day or even every week! Why does it surprise anyone that kids can't take pride in chores that they don't do in any long-term sense? Not to mention that with the four-month plan, no one can lie and say "it's not my turn!"

Btw, about Gemma Hartley...

Yes, it may sound silly for her to complain about having to take five seconds to ask her husband to put the box away, even though he was the one who took it out. The trouble is that when she has to make polite, reasonable requests like that every day - and likely more than once a day - he's going to start thinking of her as a nag anyway, no matter how polite and unemotional her tone of voice might be. Again, it's about losing one's sense of perspective - in this case, the husband losing perspective.

I explained above Lenona. Women for the most part are hypergamous. They demand their spouse be better than them. At least in their eyes. People who do exactly what you recommend "simply exchange chores every four months" get divorced. And it is the woman who initiates it.

Got a study of families that USED the four-month plan in the first place? Didn't think so. As I said, one seldom hears of such families at all. If there are children involved, that's likely because parents are often weaklings who think that whenever kids start to cry over a rule, that means the rule is wrong - no matter how reasonable it is! As in "no, you can't have soda and ice cream for breakfast; no, you can't drop out of fourth grade just because some celebrities did that, etc., etc."

Not that kids would really be happier with changing chores every day, of course. They just get TEMPORARILY angry when parents dare to act like bosses - and make it harder for the kids to cheat!

(Btw, celebrities who drop out of school even before their teens are not new; there's at least one pretty famous 4th-grade dropout who was born in the 1890s and who lived to be 100. Guess who.)

Not to mention that everyone says that sex and money problems are the causes of divorce. Housework don't even get mentioned as the third main reason. Maybe because it isn't in the top three, actually?

"The trouble is that when she has to make polite, reasonable requests like that every day - and likely more than once a day - he's going to start thinking of her as a nag anyway, no matter how polite and unemotional her tone of voice might be."

Completely true. No one likes to be told on a regular basis that they did something wrong or that they should maybe change their behavior--no matter how soft the delivery. Never has my husband been completely chill about receiving these kinds of comments from me, even super-casual, kindly-presented "I" statements. He's a wonderful person and I'm blessed to be married to him, so I strive to let 99% of everyday annoyances just float on by. I shudder to think of how often I must annoy or disappoint him, but he never dwells on those things so I'm not going to act like my job in life is to make sure he knows on a regular basis how to become a more-perfect husband.
IMO, the priority of a marriage or any long-term relationship is keeping a peaceful home that is a place of welcome for all who live there. I want my husband and my kids to look forward to seeing me and talking to me--not hunch their shoulders and wonder "what now?" Everyone of us is a mixed bag of virtue and vice--not to mention that we all have simple preferences that are not "right" or "wrong"--so give enormous slack to the people you love.
Before you marry, you should have a good idea of the other person's habits and attitudes. Don't marry them if you can't figure out a way to live with them as they are. Hopefully there will be some smoothing of the edges but don't count on it. For instance, I refused to even date anyone who smoked (the only exception being if they occasionally smoked weed but I wasn't too happy about that either since I didn't partake and it does reek). I find the smell of cigarette/cigar/pipe smoke in the house and on their person absolutely putrid, plus I would be terrified that my partner would die early just like all the smokers in my family have. On the other hand, my best friend has a husband who leaves absolutely everything he touches wherever he wants to. Dumps clothes all over the house, ditto with mail. Leaves cabinets and drawers open. Makes a sandwich and not only leaves a mess, but leaves all ingredients on the counter and walks away for hours. Nothing like a little salmonella to go with your sliced turkey! I'm tired of hearing her bitch about this; he was like this when they married 20+ years ago and he never gave any indication that he wanted to work seriously on changing it. And it's not like he's not some dreamy, absent-minded professor either, where you might look this behavior with some fond bemusement...he's a sharp, successful well-organized businessman. I would not have married someone like that lest I kill them before our first anniversary, but if I had, I would have made mental peace with it after a few years and two kids.

Women do not admire and respect a man who makes less than they do, as mentioned above, and this is reflected in the article in question above. Studies have clearly shown that in marriages where the division of chores is more traditional the wives are happier and divorce is lower. The reward for the husband for painting a room is greater than for doing dishes.

“Got a study of families that USED the four-month plan in the first place? Didn't think so. As I said, one seldom hears of such families at all. If there are children involved, that's likely because parents are often weaklings who think that whenever kids start to cry over a rule, that means the rule is wrong - no matter how reasonable it is! As in "no, you can't have soda and ice cream for breakfast; no, you can't drop out of fourth grade just because some celebrities did that, etc., etc."”

Very few families are regimented, and the ones that are, for the most part are miserable.
I’ve seen some of them.

Somehow I don’t think that it ever occurs to you Lenona, that those of us who are married, are not drill sergeants looking to extract maximum organization, efficiency and frugality out of our spouses and children.

We want them to be polite and kind to other people, and the best parents model that behavior rather than dictating it.

We love our spouses and children and want them to be happy. Our desire for order and peace, is tempered by our wish not to abuse people we love, or perfect them in our own image.
This is not something you can learn from a book.
Certain behavior that is totally disruptive to family life can be corrected, but you have to chose your battles very carefully.

39 years of marriage, and my husband still never looks behind him to turn out the lights. I can make myself miserable and him too, or I can do it myself. You’ve lived alone too long Lenona. I suspect I know why.

39 years of marriage, and my husband still never looks behind him to turn out the lights. I can make myself miserable and him too, or I can do it myself.}}}}

Oh yeah. Thirty years together, two adult children, and I am still the only person in the bunch who seems to understand that if we are all getting ready to go out, someone needs to turn off the TV and the lights and lock the back door before we leave. If I didn't do it, it wouldn't get done.

"...You’ve lived alone too long Lenona. I suspect I know why."
OMG Where is the thumbs-up button????

***
The lady who wrote the original screed made a request that she knew her husband would not complete. Yes, it was a shit-test. Maybe she likes to be angry. Maybe she just wanted something new to complain about. Having a cleaner house wasn't the goal; making him do her bidding was. They both suck. Making a chore chart isn't going to fix that.

Care to present the list of studies that support your assigned course of action Lenona?

Since you are big on studies today:
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/jomf.12372

As for the sex and money complaints, yep. And if you do a chore rotation like you suggest she will lose respect for you, there will be no sex, she will complain, and then you are divorced. I just removed some of the middle steps.

Female hypergamy appears to be genetic.

"...you simply cannot postpone all the time-consuming indoor cleaning chores either just because you, personally, don't see or smell anything bad. As in: No, you can't leave dishes in the sink for hours; no, you can't dust and vacuum only once a month..."

I can and do, just like i don't clean off my desk or pay bills until the new ones slide off no matter how carefully i try to set them on top.

I do like to have doors, drawers, and cabinet doors completely shut, though.

"The gift, for me, was ... the fact that for once I would not be in charge of the household office work. I would not have to make the calls, get multiple quotes, research and vet each service, arrange payment and schedule the appointment. The real gift I wanted was to be relieved of the emotional labor of a single task that had been nagging at the back of my mind."

But you didn't ask for that, you asked for "a house cleaning service. Bathrooms and floors specifically, windows if the extra expense was reasonable." You did't specify what "reasonable" meant either.

"...make the calls, get multiple quotes, research and vet each service, arrange payment and schedule the appointment." How is that emotional labor?

Before you marry, you should have a good idea of the other person's habits and attitudes. Don't marry them if you can't figure out a way to live with them as they are. Hopefully there will be some smoothing of the edges but don't count on it. For instance, I refused to even date anyone who smoked
_____________________________________________

I absolutely agree. Especially with regard to smoking. As the wise woman said: "If something irritates you before marriage, it will drive you crazy after marriage."

I also learned long ago - from a nonfiction book I read as a teen, mind you - that you shouldn't expect any adult to change in the way that YOU would prefer. Better to be alone than to wish you were. (What I didn't hear until many years later is that adults DO change as they get older - that is, they lose interest in the things they used to care about and take up other interests, which can be pretty challenging, for both sexes, to a relationship that was based on mutual interests.)

And Isab, I take it you sort of forgot what I said, long ago, about how I didn't drink as a teen because I liked solitude (and constant silence, I could have added) and I was picky about whom I considered a real friend and what I considered to be a good time. (I also had little understanding of the concept of teen peer pressure; I couldn't sympathize with it.) Plus what I said, long ago, about how it takes a ton of personality for me to take a serious interest in anyone, as opposed to a casual friendship - and I consider fancy restaurant outings to be a waste, so they don't flatter me. On top of that, like a lot of men who don't want children, it's hard for me to see the point of pursuing a live-in relationship with anyone. If it shouldn't reflect badly on men who feel that way, what's the difference?

that those of us who are married, are not drill sergeants looking to extract maximum organization, efficiency and frugality out of our spouses and children.

We want them to be polite and kind to other people, and the best parents model that behavior rather than dictating it.
_______________________________________

The latter describes the Frugal Zealot, Amy Dacyczyn, plus Judith Martin, aka Miss Manners. Except they ALSO wanted highly disciplined behavior in their families, and got it, presumably because their husbands wanted the same, and they were smart enough to look for such husbands. They've both been married for decades, have children, and, from all reports, are happy.

I have never heard anyone refer to either writer as a drill sergeant in the home, even though each writer has likely been made fun of at some point - mainly by those who haven't read their books, or those who want discipline from others but refuse to model any. (Take the spendthrift wife who expects the husband to be frugal so she can spend more - I have no sympathy for that.)

From a list of mine I think I posted here, way back (if you want the rest of it, just ask):

10. Thou shalt both play the game of who can do more, not less, and all shall live reasonably happily ever after.

And if anyone wants to know whom I might have wanted to date, at least, I'd be tempted to say George Carlin - but then again, I suspect I wouldn't really have wanted that, given his truly terrifying drug abuse. (I suspect his daughter never had kids in part because BOTH her parents were scary that way.) But otherwise, I know for a fact he was a very nice man offstage.

What I see is that it hasn't occurred to her to say what she needs... Because she doesn't know. She can't see "I need you to put things away when you are done with them" because she sees all the individual things.

Similarly, she didn't say: For my birthday I want you to research cost and quality for cleaning companies for doing the floors and bathrooms, pick the best, and get us set up on a schedule... Our budget is X. Instead she said, "hire someone to do X" and got cheesed he thought X was the thing she wanted.

Knowing what you want - and very clearly communicating it - are the two steps to giving someone a chance to provide it without just guessing wildly.

Good, Anon.

Aside from marriage:

As it happens, John Rosemond, another example of someone who's been happily married for decades AND expected and got disciplined, considerate children while refusing to micromanage them, wrote this about children and discipline, in 2001:

"Leadership is not a matter of IQ, socio-economic status, the schools one attended, academic achievements, or the books one has read. It's a matter of a certain attitude, one that conveys a calm, self-confident natural authority.

"Like myself, most Americans older than over the age of 50 were raised by parents who occupied positions of natural authority, parents who ruled not by creating a host of rules, but by communicating broad expectations in a clear, and compelling manner.

"Good example: In the 1950s, it was rare that a parent so much as even checked to make sure a child had done his or her homework. Yet, most baby boomers did their homework (most of the time). Ask someone my age (54) why that was the case and he or she is likely to answer, 'Well, 've never really thought about it, but I guess I did my homework because my parents and teachers expected me to do it.' "

"the reality is if a house looks like crap it's the woman going to be judged, scolded by in-laws, etc."

The INSIDE of the house. Don't even get me started on the judgment placed on men regarding lawns and other exterior householdry.
The grass is always greener on the other side.

"Yeah, the writer is a piece of work but her husband is having serious adulting problems."

Well, yeah, seeing as they're BOTH human...

"It was about her deciding that what she wanted was for her husband to magically become her so she could take a break and be him."

Amazing how progressives, when it comes to Trump's tariffs will wave Ricardo's comparative advantage in your face, but drop it like a hot potato when it comes up to men and women.

"The woman LITERALLY SAID she wanted a professional to come clean. Where's the mind reader in that? Hire a professional!"

And then explained that this was NOT what she really wanted. She wanted it to be magical - for it to happen prescriptively according to her exact way of doing things, without he havint to think about, explain, or otherwise concern herself about it - prett much the definition of magic. Let's hope her day job doesn't include writing Requests for Proposals/Bids.

"The wife, in this case, is not making her expectations clear."

BINGO! and she assumed that a man would understand the intricacies of womens' thinking, when she clearly hasn't a clue about how men think.

"Though it does occur to me that people with no experience hiring help might not know things like"

Finally at this late stage in the discussion it occurs to you. I refer you again to Ricardo's comparative advantage - she asked a pre-industrial Briton to make wine or a pre-industrial Frenchmen to make wool.

"And Isab, I take it you sort of forgot what I said, long ago, about how I..."

You describe perfectly someone with either grossly unrealistic expectations or too far down the autism spectrum to ever tolerate another person being too great a part of my life.

" If it shouldn't reflect badly on men who feel that way, what's the difference?"

Maybe it should reflect badly on men. It's not an approach conducive to sustaining civilization from either sex.

About those unrealistic expectations, when only a major celebrity comes to mind as filling the bill, that's textbook - what makes you think George Carlin would ever be interested?

"That is, neither men or women should not have to do seriously dangerous jobs they are not trained to do, such as roof repair, just to save money."

Why not? I have. The risks are easily managed, the roof looks great and will last 30 years, and all the neighbors think I'm some kind magical being.

"For instance, I refused to even date anyone who smoked."

In gun safety courses, the first thing taught is never point a gun at someone you are not prepared to shoot, and never shoot someone you are not prepared to kill.

I like to alter that and say never date (or get physical with) someone with whom you are not prepared to fall in love, and never fall in love with someone you could not marry.

That covers the smoker thing.

Um, maybe because a lot of people don't have a head for heights? Basic carpentry has nasty risks too, but not potentially fatal ones, as a rule. Which is why more men and women alike are willing to tackle that.

And I merely cited Carlin because he was an example that everyone is familiar with, not because I think that most celebrity marriages last - I'm sure they don't, especially when the other spouse is a nobody. He was smart, realistic, charismatic, slightly optimistic, and gracious even towards strangers. How is that too much to ask? Especially when I would never expect anyone to spend more money on me than I would spend on him? (Mind you, I also DON'T expect anyone to make me laugh out loud indefinitely - how can any comedians really stay fresh for their audiences once their styles become predictable? A lot of the time, as they age, what they get is just polite laughter.)

Bottom line is: Most people today are not interested in something that resembles an arranged marriage just for the sake of raising children or financial security or even curing loneliness. Loneliness is not love, even if it feels like it at the time. Of course, romantic love is usually not sustainable, but if there's no fire at all, there likely won't be any fire AFTER marriage either. (Margo Howard had a pretty good column on that - maybe I can find it.)

Finally, in case I wasn't clear: I was referring to those men who don't WANT children. It only makes sense for many of them, at least, to avoid marrying women who just might want children eventually. Better for a lot of women, too. That way, there are fewer misunderstandings, and the men and women who want children will find it easier to find each other and "sustain civilization," if that's what you meant. Not to mention that there is no shortage of highly accomplished men and women who never had children, and some never married either. How were THEY bad for society?

So a woman who doesn't want children needs extra reasons to make a huge commitment to another human being. Especially since she likely already has her aging parents to support.

OK, found it. It's from 2013.

https://www.creators.com/read/dear-margo/02/13/to-love-versus-quotbeing-in-lovequot-b7a0f

Very good in its own way - it's about how romantic love is not sustainable. The minister even criticized "Song of Solomon."

Unfortunately, when I clicked on the comments, I found they'd been erased. Those were just as important. One said something like "you can't marry someone you're not attracted to and expect the attraction to happen."

(I know I printed the comments, way back, but it would take me too long to find them - for this thread, anyway.)

Btw, Margo Howard is the daughter of Ann Landers and has been married four times - and wrote an autobiography.