Tag: household chores

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Dad Blogs Family Fatherhood Life in these United States Marriage

I Don’t Do Laundry!

520774_35699356 In a show of solidarity for the union workers up at that glass company, I too am having a “sit in.” Course, my sit in really doesn’t involve me sitting anywhere, but more like I’m passively boycotting doing something here at the house. Allow me to explain:

I do my fair share of household chores with nary a complaint. I’ll wash dishes, clean windows and vacuum floors simply because they need doing, without having to be nagged or asked to. I don’t mind getting my hands dirty, or getting on my hands and knees to scrub baseboards if it needs it (course, I’d rather see CareerMom doing it, but that’s another blog post entirely), but there’s one chore that I just really do not like to do even though I know it is probably one of the most mundane and least offensive ones around–laundry.

I don’t really mind laundry in general. I mean, streaky underwear from the boys doesn’t bother me, and neither do sweaty lycra gym clothes, but what I particularly dislike is folding laundry. If there is any activity more mindless than sitting there on the floor with a huge pile of clothes just awaiting your hand, I don’t know it.

Granted, I’m not a great folder. I know how to tuck one sock up into another to keep them as a family. I’m a pretty good “whomper” of towels and jeans when they need a good straightening to get the wrinkles out. But shirts are a whole nuther issue entirely. I simply cannot fold shirts, despite military training, which included a pair of tweezers, a hot iron and flimsy Fruit-o-the-Loom brown tees.

Needless to say, anything that drags out the process of folding clothes–especially shirts–just drives me friggin’ nuts. Which brings me back to why I’m boycotting.

Certain members of my household don’t bother flipping their shirts right-side-out when they take them off. And it’s not just one person in the house doing it. It’s also the young ones who often need assistance with the removal of their clothes and whose preferred quick removal move of choice involves grabbing the hem of their shirts and pulling them, inside out, over their heads, after which the shirts are summarily tossed into the laundry without undergoing a reverse process  to turn them outside-in. This means that when I’m sitting there folding the dad-blamed things, not only do I have to fumble with them as I’m folding them, but I also have to take the time to flip them outside-in!

And THAT, my friends, is intolerable.

So, I’m boycotting. It’s a passive boycott mind you. I’m not telling anyone (but you all) about it. No, instead, I’m simply NOT flipping the offending articles of clothing back outside-in.

My new laundry motto: How I get ’em, is how you get ’em!

I’m curious to see if the point is taken.

What about you? What’s your most despised chore?

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Dad Blogs Family Fatherhood

Reason #23 why I couldn’t be a stay-at-home-dad

I could never be a stay at home dad for a variety of reasons, but the primary reason is boredom. I’d either be constantly ignoring my kids because I couldn’t stand one more second of playing Thomas the Tank or teaching over their shoulder how to play a video game, or I’d be buying them a new toy every other day just so I could keep myself happy.

For instance, even though there’s generally nobody here at the house all day, either myself or CareerMom ALWAYS make the boys’ beds up before we leave. Now, MLI has a number of pillows on his bed, and since one of my all-time least favorite things to do from a chores perspective(right behind putting laundry away and unloading the dishwasher), is making beds, I always try and mix up the pillow arrangement.

It’s my own personal pillow challenge each time I do it.

For instance, here’s one arrangement:

IMG_2315

and here’s another:

IMG_2316

As you can see, gravity defiance and lateral similarity is prized above good looks.

I read a blog yesterday whereas the wife was complaining a bit about how anal her husband was. I had a hard time relating…

Can you imagine how insane the house would be if I were here all day?
I mean, I might start bobby pinning together socks with the boys’ names on them so I could tell them apart when CareerMom buys them matching socks, something that, for the life of me, I can’t figure out.

Maybe I would actually put all the big forks in one slot in the silverware divider, and all the small forks in another. Spoons too.

I could vacuum the carpet so that all of the vacuum marks are equidistant from one another, and all grained in one direction.

Heck, I might even go around, every day, with a bottle of Windex and a paper towel and get off (heh heh, I said “Get off!”) all the toothpaste spray marks from the mirrors.

I don’t know…haven’t given it too much thought.

But suffice it to say that I’m way to uptight to be a SAHD, so to you guys out there who do it, my hat is off to you. Oh, and you moms too I guess (KIDDING!)

Speaking of hats! Oh man, I could build a hat rack and hang it in the closet and then we could put all of our hats up there in order from…

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Dad Blogs DIY Family Fatherhood Marriage

So easy, even a Caveman could do it…

caveWith CareerMom out of town again, it’s just us boys here at the house. Now, when I was single, I was a pretty neat guy. In fact, my condo was usually cleaner than most homes you find today, and I’m still pretty clean, generally speaking. However, I must say that with no estrogen-influence wafting through the house, hygiene and general cleanliness is more of an effort than it normally seems to be.

DIY has a show called, “Man Caves” and it’s basically where a homeowner carves out a spot in the house somewhere, typically a basement, for the man of the house. What the man does down in this area usually revolves around a large-screen television and a wetbar, although I suspect these are just the things publicly disclosed. Well, without CareerMom here, our whole house feels like a Man Cave.

So far, I’ve contemplated not shaving, not brushing my teeth before bed last night and I literally had to drag my butt up today and throw a load of laundry on to wash just so the boys would have some jeans to wear tomorrow should the cool weather hang around. When CareerMom is here, these things aren’t even a conscious decision; I just do them. Without her here, I have to make myself comply. It’s eerie! And this doesn’t even begin to cover how many times someone has said, “I tooted!”
I’m not sayin’ that I said that, just that someone has said it on numerous occasions. If you haven’t noticed yet, fart humor is highly prized by the “Boys under 10” crowd.

Now, in my defense, part of this has to do with the fact that when CareerMom is here, I have help–I’m not doing everything myself. So by the time I have a few minutes to myself–like now–catching up on the household chores is about the last thing on my mind.

Oh, and let me complain for just a second here: CareerMom arranged for her mom to pick up the boys from Daycare tomorrow evening to give me a bit of a break. But the catch is, I have to pick them up by 6:30.

6:30?

At the risk of sounding ungrateful…um…why bother? That’s like a whole hour later than I’d normally have them home anyway. And I’m betting there will be no free dinner involved either. Wow! What ever will I do with myself for that extra hour?

Probably the dishes.