Good question, Daisy. I'll skip the Wise-Assery on this one and give it to you straight: I don't believe that any household task is better suited to one sex or the other, and I'm not just saying that because this is a women's site. I'm saying it because it's what I believe.

As a kid I spent every holiday at my grandparents' house with my cousins and aunts and uncles. After every feast, the uncles and kids would waddle off to the den for naps or outside to play while the women spent the next two hours cleaning up and washing dishes from the meal -- the meal they'd cooked. Worst of all? No one ever gave it a second thought. It's just how things were done. I was a teenager before it dawned on me one Thanksgiving that, like, WTF?

In my house, my wife and I share chores equally. We both clean up, we both do laundry, we both grocery shop and cook, we both take care of the kid and the dogs and the fish. There are certain things that each of us does a little better than the other, but it has absolutely nothing to do with gender.

For example, my wife is a better handyperson than I am: not only does she have a knack for it, she's patient, she reads the directions, and she grew up with a father and brother who liked to fix things. None of those applies to me, so I suck at home fix-it. I have ruined more things than I care to remember. Like the basement door, where I cut a dog entry into the top of the door instead of the bottom. Oops. I guess the dogs might have learned to get a running start and leap through a 2' x 2' hole five feet off the ground, but why put them through that? Needless to say, when something needs fixing, she does it and I stay the hell out of the way.

On the other hand, I'm a better cook than my wife. I'm more interested in it than she is, so I notice and remember things that she doesn't. I'm also more creative -- a good or bad thing, depending. I also do most of the grocery shopping because she hates it and I do it quicker and buy more good junk food than she does.

So, to STFU about me and answer your question, that's how I think couples should share duties: do the things you enjoy doing, or at least hate doing less than the other, and don't worry about what's "man's work" or "woman's work."

Schedules make a difference, too. Whoever has a shorter or less stressful work day than the other can and should take on more home duties that day. Tomorrow it might be your turn. Quid pro quo, Clarice.

It's all about flexibility, accomodation, and not having a mindset that was last dusted off when Ike was president.