NOT ME: I draw the line at yardwork.
Still in the middle of building a house, I find myself, this week, temporarily without a kitchen and the internet.
Being offline has proved a challenge. The children can't do their homework, which, no longer takes place on paper but on live drives on the internet. I haven't been able to work at home, and I have felt stranded from the news " with a feeling of dread that something major could be happening.
I found myself reaching for my phone automatically every 10 minutes to check news, only to remember I was cut off.
Being without the internet at home gained me much sympathy at work, with choruses of "oh no, how do you cope?"
I am not alone in feeling anxious about being offline, even temporarily. A consumer behaviour survey, this week, says lack of access to the internet is causing anxiety for some Kiwis.
In the Canstar Blue survey of 1127 people, almost half said they felt "stressed" without the internet. Thirty-six per cent also admitted checking or updating their social accounts multiple times each day, 40 per cent said they "wasted a lot of time" surfing the internet.
When respondents were separated by gender, 14 per cent of men were noticing harmful effects on their real-life relationships compared with 9 per cent of women. Perhaps women have more "real stuff" to do. Paint their nails and wax their legs. Read magazines. Take care of the children. Clean. Cook.
But being without the kitchen, as well as the internet, has let me off the cooking. Being without a kitchen has caused me less anxiety than not being online.
And got me less sympathy, with some even saying I was lucky to be able to eat takeaways.
If truth be told, I rarely step foot in a kitchen other than to take some wine out of the fridge. My other half does all the cooking and I do all the cleaning.
It is a division of labour that suits us. Among my friends and colleagues it is not that uncommon among working couples.
I know many men who do all the supermarket shopping and most of the cooking.
Personally, I draw the line at yardwork. I remember feeling shocked when I first came to New Zealand and saw women mowing the lawn (and it still shocks me). But a female friend who does it, says it keeps her fit and she enjoys it, and says I shouldn't be so sexist.
Divisions of labour between the sexes are a big change from a previous generation where many of us remember the kitchen as our mother's domain.
If women still want to be in the kitchen and that suits them, then that's perfectly fine. But thankfully most of us have moved away from that era when it was felt that it was a woman's duty, like it or not, to make all the food.
It seems like NZ Pork is still stuck in the 50s. Its new advertising campaign takes sexist pig a bit literally. People took to the internet (of course) to label it sexist and embarrassing.
The campaign-called Mum's Night Off, urges men to "give their wife a night of unforgettable pleasure". Not with some Fifty Shades-like experiences, but by getting them out of the kitchen.
"We reckon it's time more women got out of the kitchen and more men started to man them."
The campaign's website is full of cringing phrases, urging men to "stop scratching your nuts, get your apron on" (hopefully washing his hands in between). It has recipes called "Your Big Pork Balls", and "Get Away With Anything Pork Scallopini" where the recipe how-to list includes video instructions to "leave the toilet seat up", "buy her a mower for her birthday", "fart on her pillow", and "tell her she is starting to look like her mother".
Its kitchen glossary lists swede as: "A vegetable, not a giggly blonde tourist."
We get it. It is supposed to be funny. And its humour is sure to appeal to some, even if it is a bit cliched. But in terms of its universe the advert is set up to fail because if, like it says, all women are in the kitchen, then they are also doing the shopping. I cannot imagine this campaign would entice them to buy NZ pork.
Mind you, if they are stuck in the kitchen and with the sort of man who these recipes would appeal to, then they might buy the pork just to get a night off from kitchen slavery.
Or they could leave him.
But then there would be no-one to mow the lawn and take the rubbish out.