Cooking-related Dilemma -- long

[RevDahlia]

I don't know if this belongs here. It is food-related, kinda, and you guys are real smart and stuff and can maybe help me out.

I live with three other people: hubby, hubby's brother, and "Andy", who is a friend of the BIL. We share grocery expenses equally, splitting the bills up at the end of the month; this works fine, and it also allows me a little more freedom to pursue culinary adventures that I might not be able to afford otherwise.

Hubby and I have a nice system going -- at least it'll be nice once we get our own place. I decide what we're having for dinner. I email him a shopping list, he hits Safeway on the way home, I make dinner.

Here's the problem. Remember Andy and BIL? They eat too. I always make enough for everybody, and they happily scarf down their share. When I get home, before they even say hello they'll ask what's for dinner.

The problem is the cleanup effort. Theoretically, whoever ate and didn't cook has to clean up. Hubby is great about this, but he shouldn't have to deal with it all the time and he knows it. BIL is less great about it, but still OK. I can count on him doing a sinkful of dishes twice a week, and maybe a mop on the weekends. Andy has never, in the nine months he's been living here, ever ever chipped in on cleaning the kitchen. Ever. Today I came home to find several days' worth of wreckage accumulated, with Andy happily washing ONE bowl and ONE spoon with which to eat his Special K. "Kate, the kitchen is really a mess," he said with kind of a tut-tut expression all over his very pretty face. "By the way, what's for dinner?" I asked him if he wouldn't mind helping me tidy up, and he begged off on the grounds that he "was feeling under the weather" and wandered away to do whatever it is he does.

Fume, fume, fume.

Then I got to thinking. Cooking big elaborate dinners is really my thing. I do it because I enjoy it, and other people take care of the boring bits -- the shopping and, theoretically at least, the cleaning. I'm basically playing, and having a grand ol' time. I know the other folks around the house like my food and would miss it if it wasn't there, but food is my hobby, not theirs. I feel sort of like I would if my hobby was woodworking, and I kept making beautiful but unasked-for objects for the house and then insisting that everyone else sweep up the shavings.

So, the way I see it is this: I can accept that the food issue is basically My Thing, and that I should assume responsibility for it part and parcel. If we adopt this as policy, what it will mean is that I'll do a lot less cooking. Our kitchen is the size of a box of Tide and has a total of fourteen inches of counter space, and we don't have a dishwasher -- so it must be kept spotless at all times in order to be usable. I don't want to spend every waking moment of my life cleaning the fucker. But not cooking would make for an unhappier me.

Or I can attempt to bludgeon the guys into pitching in more often, and come off like a nagging shrew.

What the hell do I do? Have some kind of house summit? BIL and Andy won't see the need -- they have a pretty sweet deal going, after all.

This has gone on long enough.

[Dingfod]

Boot to the head.
:rollpin:

Seriously, you're afraid you'll come off a nagging shrew if you demand they do their part? I'd stop cooking big dinners that included them if I were you. When they start whining about you never making enough for them, you let them have it with both barrels. "You lazy worthless fucksticks aren't getting a morsel of my home cooked goodness until you agree to pitch in by doing the dishes." Do you think they need a schedule of who's turn it is to do the dishes? That's what my mom did. Even though she did the vast majority of the cooking (my dad only just learned to fix his own eggs), she hardly ever did the dishes after dinner. She had her troops do KP, all five of us kids and dad did the dishes... by hand. There was no automatic dishwasher, those were for rich folks.


Warren

[HelenM]

So, the way I see it is this: I can accept that the food issue is basically My Thing, and that I should assume responsibility for it part and parcel. If we adopt this as policy, what it will mean is that I'll do a lot less cooking. Our kitchen is the size of a box of Tide and has a total of fourteen inches of counter space, and we don't have a dishwasher -- so it must be kept spotless at all times in order to be usable. I don't want to spend every waking moment of my life cleaning the fucker. But not cooking would make for an unhappier me.

Or I can attempt to bludgeon the guys into pitching in more often, and come off like a nagging shrew.

What the hell do I do? Have some kind of house summit? BIL and Andy won't see the need -- they have a pretty sweet deal going, after all.

This has gone on long enough.

I suggest you talk to your husband first and ask for his support in talking to Andy about helping and BIL about helping more than he is at present. It will help if it's clearly coming from both of you, rather than just you.

I think it's entirely appropriate to tell the other two men that you enjoy cooking for them, but you really need help with cleaning up otherwise you're not going to be able to continue cooking as you have been. And then, rather than 'nag' (i.e. keep saying it and keep cooking) you can stop cooking for anyone who won't help clean up.

In one way or another, you need to shift the balance so those who don't help find it sets in motion some negative consequences for them rather than you picking up the slack for them.

But hopefully the end result will be that you get to keep cooking and get more help. And you can be clear that this is what you want, rather than not cooking for them.

I hope you're able to resolve it to your reasonable satisfaction, anyway :).

Helen

[viscousmemories]

Thank BIL for contributing as much as he does, subtly implying that he could do more, while less subtly alluding to the fact that Andy does nothing. Let BIL play the heavy with Andy, since he's his friend anyway. Don't be surprised, though, if Andy still does nothing. Slacking can be a real art. :didi:

[Brimshack]

Remove the ambiguity.

Assign the responsibility for washing dishes to one or two persons at a time in rotation whenever there is a group meal. If someone wishes to not do dishes, then he is choosing not to partake. This way you end up doing some dishes even thuogh you do most of the cooking, but as you say, you enjoy the latter, and more importantly, you are clearly doing this anyway. My point is that it's too easy for each to assume someone else will do it so long as the responsibility falls on 3 separate people. This way, eah person would in turn be on the spot.

...and what is for dinner anyway? I'm famished!

[Dingfod]

...and what is for dinner anyway? I'm famished!We've got roadkill stew, possum nut pie, boiled rutabagas, and grits. For dessert, we've got hickory nuts sauteed in pork fat, sweetened with sludge from the moonshine still. That's what's for dinner. Mmm-mmmm!

Oh, wait. This belongs in that other thread.


Grandpa Wobbly

[RevDahlia]

Thanks for all the great advice, you guys. I talked to hubby and he pointed out that (duh) we're moving out in three months, and as such it is both futile and not our responsibility to try to train Andy. We just have to put up with it for a little while longer, after which point he'll move in with his girlfriend and she can deal with him. It's no use talking to the BIL; he is incredibly prickly and defensive and hates being told what to do, and will do his best to make my life miserable if I try.

Hubby also mentioned that gender stereotypes are probably at work here; Andy, though an nth-generation American, is nonetheless a member of a pretty patriarchal culture. He'd never admit it, but I think on some level he's seeing me as the lady of the house, the One who Takes Care of Household Shit, and he simply doesn't see the messes as being his lookout.

I can't just cook smaller meals, because we do split the grocery bills evenly. So what I will do is lavish positive reinforcement on whoever desides to lift a finger, and soldier on. Hubby says he will help take up the slack. He's a good guy.

(Now Andy is sitting on the couch, eating leftovers and smacking loudly. I think I should go for a walk.)