plus deal with the dustbin / recycling and clean out the litter tray (thank heavens that the kittens will have that withdrawn fairly soon).

I argue with the TV a lot

I make pronouncements that no one listens to

I buy books for my wife

I am a human ATM machine for my son

I come home from work and annouce "Guess who's home?" and no one ever attempts to guess.

So yeah I think we are surplus to requirements

Now where did I put the key to the drinks cabinet?

- mowing grass
- putting bins out
- making holiday arrangements
- checking the level of heating oil and ordering more if needed
- cooking
- operating Sky+/DVDs/CDs
- reading bed time stories

I never get involved in any household finances. other than that, most other tasks are shared, although not always in equal proportion.

Mrs P never carries out any of the above tasks, so I feel my place within the family is justified in some way.

Its very manly to fiddle with wires to provide the latest and most wonderful in home entertainment. Of course this ignores the act that most women would happily watch TV on a 14" set with adjustable aerial.

before I let her mow it (the lawn, not the cr*p).

Answer the phone & door (apparently I'm better at getting rid of people - not sure that is a compliment, but my circle of friends is indeed minute)

Spider remover (as per The Hep)

Wash the car (inc. check oil, tyres etc)

er - that's about it, really

oh, and change tv channels to whatever she wants to watch

of my accommodation. If I don't do it, it doesn't get done.

Quite a lot doesn't get done...

Ironing
Washing
Vacuum Cleaning
Making Breakfast
Buying wine
Doing the Finance
Bed Time Stories
Stern Letters to builders, utility companies
Buying Wine
Putting wife in family way
Buying Wine
Organising car servicing and MOT
Cutting Grass
Killing Weeds
Buying Wine
Buying Beer
Letting the kids watch me struggle with the tricky Maj7 chords in Wichita Lineman

That just about covers it. And my wife does the same. And she cooks.

Therefore, she wins.

Though of course none of this is gender specific if describes my Dad pretty well:

There is a kind of love called maintenance
Which stores the WD40 and knows when to use it

Which checks the insurance, and doesn’t forget
The milkman; which remembers to plant bulbs;

see http://www.jeanettewinterson.com/pages/content/index.asp?PageID=414

Without me, she's nothing.

For some reason this is the only kitchen duty that I am actually better at than Mrs S.

Within the last month I have felted the shed roof, taken a washing machine apart (a bit), investigated a plumbing mishap from the shower (ongoing) and repeatedly presided over a barbecue. I like to think that it's also traditional that I do these badly.

Our two cats bring dead stuff into the house, from little cute ex-mice, to full sized rats, and the occassional bunny (or bits of bunny, frankly)

All of which will only be moved by me. If the killing happens whilst I am at work, then the body may be covered up with kitchen roll til I get home.

Dog poo on the lawn, cat poo in the fireplace or bath (when they can't get our) Actually, all poo around the place.

And when the pipes to the cess-pit blocks, you guessed it.......

As I believe the term is, are:

* DIY
* Working computers and electrical things
* Any activity that requires any sort of patience (which my other half is devoid of)

That's about it really.

employed new window cleaners, expecting me to tell the old lot that their services are no longer required, that being "your job".

We're still getting a twice-monthly clean.

... because Mrs Ganglesprocket appears to be the chief organizer of most things involving our household. But I do wash a lot of dishes and do most of the laundry and cleaning.

As for things that "only" I can do, spider removal is about it sadly.

filling up the car with petrol.

Dog Walking/Grooming
Crap Removal
CD/DVD Organiser
Car Washer
Heavy Lifting
and , worst of all,
Purse Holder as GLW searches for whatnot

and the mucking about with.

Yesterday I cut through the cord on my hedge trimmers. Didn't even notice (until the blades stopped).

You won't catch a woman doing that.

All the shopping
All the cooking
Anything garden related
Anything to do with the car
Anything to do with gadgets

Things I agree to do, and then don't:

Fixing things
Household finances
Putting a load on
Wiping 'those' drips up
Ringing that bloke about that thing
Closing the windows before I go out
Hanging a load out
Putting that bloody laptop down and coming to bed

Mr Drake has recently been sacked from his domestic duties as gravedigger for expired family pets. He was dismissed for gross misconduct for the following insensitive behaviour:
Luther Blissett, the cat, had been very poorly, and had we had agreed with the vet to give him the 'one-way airfare to Switzerland' treatment.
So I wasn't best pleased when, as I was getting the cat basket out of the loft ready to transport the moggy to the vets' surgery, I heard the sounds of earth being shovelled in our back garden.
I leaned out of the window to see the GGH digging the failing feline's grave. Luther was sitting watching.
"Can't you wait until he's...well...dead?" I queried. GGH realised his lack of tact at this point and glanced guiltily at the doomed Luther.
It was a vignette that could have come straight from Dead Man Walking, if my husband had been wearing a nun's habit, and Luther had sported tattoos and a quiff.

Just me then?

who'd write all the lists on the internet?
Who'd drink all the real ale?
Who'd go to all the Richard Thompson gigs?

Clearly you would think that if I have been taken back to the shop then this answered the question of what men are for. However the first Mrs Doods and I are still on good terms and this week I was called upon to sort out the internet and set her up with wifi. Perhaps not exactly hunter-gatherer, I admit.

Otherwise, guess what, I do everything, unless exceptionally I call upon the services of more competent blokes, or indeed the first Mrs. D, still far more handy with a power drill than I.

I'm really pretty good, and Mrs Rosbif leaves it to me. Otherwise, of things that I do most or all of the time, there's:

Heavy lifting
Getting up first when the sprogs were not sleeping well
Changing lightbulbs (not that she is incapable of doing it)
Cleaning
Getting rid of creepy-crawlies, up to and including mice
Bleeding the radiators
Putting up shelves, and other jobs requiring a drill

Tasks shared more or less equally include

Cooking
Washing up
Childcare

Things Mrs Rosbif tends to to:

Managing finances
Booking holidays
Arranging trips to visit friends
Putting the washing on
Sorting out playgroup/nursery/school related things

All in all, we have a good balance I reckon.

DIY - implementation as opposed to design
Cutting the hedge
Cooking roasts - Yorkshire pudding goes with any roast in Casa Malo
Spiders and any wasps / bees
Leaving the toilet seat up

rather than just "be", then things will feel much nicer. I hate to sound like a workshy philosophy student, but it's true.

Every time I read one of those articles about how IVF, sperm donation, single-parent or same-sex adoption and the increasingly crackable glass ceiling is making men redundant, I find myself quite enjoying my new-found uselessness.

The thrill of being a gratuitous and wholly decorative fixture in a woman's life is actually quite exhilarating. Or, at least it would be.

getting up in the middle of the night to check out "what that noise is" from the other end of the house. Armed with a hairbrush or something equally deadly.

in that order

otherwise expendable

jars, especially jam or pickled onions.

Other than that, being divorced, not much really.

forums?

Top up wife and daughter's pay-as-you-go phones.
Top up daughter's school lunch card.
Remove wet bath towels from daughters bed/floor.
Weekly food shop.
Manage family finances.
Mow lawn.

... last night. OK, it didn't work first time, but I got it going eventually.

Could a woman do that?

my wife rehung a door while I cooked a tagine. We are living in the rubble of traditional gender roles

Every performer needs a public.

After consulting Mr Mandy, speaking from his preferred perch (lying on the sofa, eating crisps and watching stuff on nuclear submarines on the Hitler Box - that's the life, eh?), he says his role is to do all the stuff I don't want to do and to look after me.

Can't argue with that. My role, as I understand it, is to act as a human Google and to work anything which involves keyboards or pushing buttons (includes the alarm clock, thermostat, any A/V equipment etc).

Works for us!

Loudon Wainwright III's song "I Wish I Was A Lesbian" finishes us all off.

http://open.spotify.com/track/0Ic2wysCb76Nrr5IJ2kE37

Remembering her mobile because she cant remember it herself.
Remembering her PIN number for the same reason - it's only 4 numbers for Christs sake!!
Speaking to shop keepers,teachers and people in authority when she wants to complain because it is me that has the balls.
Taking unwanted items back to shops when she wants refunds and especially when she doesn't have a receipt.
Holding my daughters hand whilst she was undergoing emergency dental treatment to put back a tooth knocked out in an accident - my wife held her other hand for a few minutes before passing out.
Putting the toilet seat back up when she insists on putting it down.
Chasing a spider and pretending you have caught it in a tissue when in reality it has crawled into your wifes jeans lying on top of the washing basket.

Bloody loads. Including shopping, cooking and earning money.

What does she do?

Not much. Looks after the offspring a bit. Pays the domestics. Sorts out the washing.

Mrs L has an easy life.

Because I'm one of life's insect-fearers and just generally a bit impractical, Mrs Specs_Beard tends to do 'outdoors', cooks and irons. I do the clearing up and domestic housework/chores.

Thing is, our 'uses' as men - and women - surely tend not to be measured in tasks. The FPO spent nearly two months recovering from an op recently, so I had a brief period of looking after her ... and then myself while she had a convalescence stay with her folks.

Any extra running around I was doing (and thanks to the in-laws I got off very lightly, believe me) sort of happened automatically and subconsciously. I think I was most useful in supplying hugs, encouragement, reassurance and distraction.

I tend to take responsibilty for all wine drinking and cd purchases.

However, I'm not sure this is very helpful for you, Mr Hepworth :(

I was the king of assembling flat pack furniture in our house.

Apart from all the usual stuff that dads do like opening jars, mowing the lawn, playing football in the garden and so on, I could also magically produce fully-formed tables, chairs, beds and cupboards from a simple cardboard box marked Ikea.

My furniture making ability appeared almost supernatural to the kids and in their eyes I was a veritable Thomas Chippendale (not that they knew who he was, mind, but you get the point).

(Insert joke here about "I bet your wife would have prefered another kind of Chippendale")

As soon as they get it.They start complaining about it!
None more irrational than a woman.

and my job is essentially to contact these people:
http://www.handysquad.com/

That - is it. However, we do eat a lot of pickles and a happy marriage has thus been sustained.

Who would peer into large holes that have been dug in the road?

I'm dealing with various tradesmen who are erecting our conservatory. This means the builder and his offsiders digging the big hole, creating new walls, knocking down existing ones and cutting through external ones. It means the plumber and electrician ripping up floors to locate cables and pipework and moving the boiler. It means brick dust and intemittent power and water.

It's my job to move stuff from room to room to allow access to stuff, to chase them when they disappear for a week without so much as a 'by your leave' - oh ... and to make an unfeasably large number of cups of tea per day.

As a treat, a new task, not on the job description, was to deal with my neighbour who had reversed into my wife's car, parked as it was, in a different place than usual, on account of the numerous vans taking up residence.

Make it stop!

My list of 'man only' domestics are:

1. get up early to feed x2 cats
2. get up early to let out x2 cats
3. stay up late and let x2 cats in for the night
4. load/unload dishwasher (thank god when we finally got one mind!)
5. full-time moaner at TV
6. full-time spider/bee/moth/bat/teradactyl remover
7. laundry/washing machine interface assistant
8. TV//broadband/applemac/virgin+ box technician
9. night-time security man (rattle/check locks, doors, windows, etc)
10. Mrs Uber-Uber's Petrol pump assistant/tyre prepressure checker/car mechanic
11. Cat poo/pee/vomit/dead thing disposer
12. full time sous-chef in the worlds smallest restaurant (1 cover, booked up for years in advance)
13. regular visitor to local recycle centre - although must admit childish satisfaction in throwing huge pieces of wood/garden refuse into skips and smashing bottles into bottle bank!
14. personal on-site ATM for when Mrs Uber-Uber feels the need to spend (quoted as often!)

Phew... and absolved of duties are:

1. Killing flies - as new cat/kitten addition 'Elvis' has admirably taken on this duty and now house is wondefully 'fly-free' during the summer months!

2. most cleaning duties involving floor/bathroom

3. household bills involving decisions on bedding/interior decoration etc

4. putting up with me!

I've had a long think about this and the answer is 'drink beer'.

My girlfriend is far better than me at assembling flat pack furniture.

However, I am much better at burning / ruining food on a barbecue than she is.

She is a crap map reader. (She really doesnt know left from right)

I am scared of spiders.

Swings & roundabouts.

Part time shirker.

Wha?

that I:

- Never listen
- Don't talk
- Sit around all day (with additional scratching, TV watching and farting duties)
- Never do anything without being asked to do it first
- Never clean properly
- Create mess
- Don't put things back where they belong

She moans but these are tasks that she is simply incapable of carrying out sufficiently.

I do the spiders and my wife does the mice (and if called upon would also do rats).

I also vac "her" stairs on a weekly basis. Mrs Pinmonkey always disputes that they are hers when I say "I've hoovered your stairs".

I also deliver the man to man speech to my son who appears to have too many girlfriends on the go at once. Unfortunately, the conversation usually begins with "Congratulations!" or "Your Mother says".

But my major skills are being wrong and being to blame for everything all the while.

That's the crucial one. And playing football/frisbee/things requiring co-ordination with my son.