Long ago, Brad decided that the chores in our house should be divided according to professional expertise. Since he’s a historian, he promised to do all the history.

So far there hasn’t been any.

Jeff worked for the State Emergency Services for awhile, and has an unhealthy obsession with fire, so he gets to do all the fire safety. Which means he occasionally tells us we should have a fire extinguisher.

And since I’m an editor, I get to do all the editing.

At first this may seem just as cruisy a job as doing the history and fire safety, but then Brad went to uni, and Jeff went to uni, and both brought me essays to edit. So I began to suspect that this system was unfair and somehow I got ripped off.

Brad used to work in nightfill and presentation at Big W. So he said that it’s only fair he should keep all the bottles, jars and tins in our kitchen pantry neatly lined up, with the labels facing outward, and all pulled forward so the pantry seems full. Which would be a fantastic help if anyone else cared about how orderly the pantry is but we don’t. Your OCD tendencies are not a sign of awesome housekeeping, Brad. You have a problem.

 

Jeff used to work at a petrol station. Sometimes he’d take my motorcycle and fill it up. This would be far more useful to me if I had ridden it very often, or if motorcycles used up a lot of petrol but it really only needed filling once month. Now if only he had a driver’s licence, he could have taken my car to get filled up every week.

Then, since Brad’s had that pantry situation sorted, and Jeff kept the bike filled up, Brad reminded me that I used to work in accounts and admin, so I get to do all the paperwork.

Did you know there’s WAY more work involved in paying household bills, organising insurance and airfares and super fund rollovers (which I’ve been meaning to do for, like, 3 years now) and filing and finding the car registration or people’s tax file numbers or the warranty papers for the new couch, than there is in putting petrol in a motorcycle now and then or turning out the labels on the pasta sauce? I’m so behind on my chores that I have a stack of filing that’s a year old, and reminder notices because I forgot to pay the phone bill – but on the bright side, I remembered the gas bill so at least we’ve got hot water, so you should be thanking me, boys.

(On a related note, I really don’t remember when I ever worked as a kitchen hand but for some reason I always seem to be doing dishes.)

Anyway – this morning I had a revelation. We should reclassify some of the chores. You know that reclassifying is part of editing, so I will selflessly take this burden upon myself. You’re welcome.

So here it is: filing is now called archiving, thus it comes under history – and you’re already, like, a year behind, Brad. Get to it!

And unpacking the dishwasher now comes under fire safety, because I’m almost completely certain that a loaded dishwasher left too long can spontaneously combust and burn down the house, Jeffrey. You’re letting the whole team down.

Shoes left out in the living room are also a fire safety hazard. What if I trip over them and break my leg during an evacuation? I’d succumb to the smoke and pass out and burn to death.

Is that what you want, Jeffrey? Is it?

Putting away the washing has to be related to shelf stacking, so you’re up again Brad. And if I get us one of the old irons that you heap the coal inside, will you consider the ironing to be a historical event?

 

Now that I’ve started, the ideas just keep rolling in. Who’s got more?