Guys, we love you, we really do. But as wonderful as you are, every so often you do something that makes us want to jump out the nearest window (or push you out first). Please, please, don’t ever…

1. Offer to “babysit” your own kids. When your 16-year-old neighbor does it, it’s called babysitting. When a parent does it, it’s called child care, and it lasts for at least 18 years. Get it?

2. Imply that office work is harder than housework. At the end of a hard day, there may be smoke coming out of your ears, but let’s face it: You’ve basically been sitting on your butt. That same smoke is coming out of our ears too—but we’ve cleaned the house, shuttled the kids around, run errands all over town and lugged grocery bags besides. When we say we’re exhausted, we are exhausted.

3. Give a home appliance as a gift. Forgive us if we can’t work it up for this one. A new washing machine? Really? Can we get you some new snow tires?

4. Buy us the “cougar” perfume. Under our crew-neck sweaters may beat the heart of an untamed vixen—but most of us don’t want to smell like one. (Nice try, though.)

5. Brag about your driving. This is supposed to let us know that ours isn’t so great. If my husband tells me one more time that he’s been “accident-free since 1978,” I’m going to reach over, grab the wheel and make the car swerve into something, just to shut him up.

6. Be unimpressed by a meal that took a lot of time and trouble. I don’t know whose fault this is (Food Network? Julie and Julia?), but every so often we get the idea that it would be fun to make stock and spend the day basting. If the result is less than earth-shattering, say something nice anyway.

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