‘I feel like I’m on holiday!’ Inside our week-long mental load marriage swap

He walks the dog and does the cleaning and finances, she organises all the meals and responds to family WhatsApps. Would their household fall apart if they changed places?

It starts with a discussion in the car, prompted by the washing up. It wasn’t done that morning. The laundry needs hanging up, too, and someone has forgotten to make the packed lunches. We need to pay the dog walker, fix the broken bath panel, work out why our toddler has started waking in the night and book our youngest in for a haircut. Then there’s a half-planned playdate to confirm, meals to plan and all those family WhatsApp group messages that need a response.

Historically, women in heterosexual relationships have carried the heft of the mental load, also known as cognitive household labour. This is the behind-the-scenes work, often intangible, that goes into running a household. It’s not just the jobs: it’s thinking about those jobs. The true extent of this work, invisible and embedded as it is, can be hard to define; an iceberg of tasks concealed beneath waves of tradition, expectation and stereotypes. It’s not just the doing, it’s the remembering, the realising, the anticipating, the assigning. It’s not just making packed lunches, it’s getting food in, making sure it’s nutritious, checking the lunchboxes are washed and ready. It’s knowing the toddler has gone off bananas and the baby can’t eat chunks of apple yet. This work is unpaid, unseen and, often, unappreciated.

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‘You took the life of someone who had given you life’: the women killed by their sons

Nearly one in 10 women who have died at the hands of men in the UK in the past 15 years were killed by their sons. Here are 10 such cases

A report has revealed that more than 170 mothers across the UK have been killed by their sons in the past 15 years – nearly one in 10 of all women who died at the hands of men.

Here we look at 10 cases of mothers killed by their sons. They underline the range of ages, backgrounds and family circumstances of the victims and perpetrators, and some key factors – most strikingly, mental health problems – that led to the killings.

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Fearing toxic waste, Greenland ended uranium mining. Now, they could be forced to restart – or pay $11bn

The island is being sued by a mining company over its decision, and faces paying nine times its annual budget in damages if it loses

Read more: Revealed: how Wall Street is making millions betting against green laws

From the iceberg-filled bay, the mountains above the town of Narsaq, in south-west Greenland, appear unremarkable. In the September warmth, clumps of grass cling to the smooth, grey peaks shaped over centuries by an enormous ice cap that lurks behind the fjords on the horizon.

Brightly coloured homes are scattered around the shoreline below, home to a community of just over 1,300 people. Were it not for a mining outhouse on the edge of town, there would be little indication of the potential riches in the rock.

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Continue ReadingFearing toxic waste, Greenland ended uranium mining. Now, they could be forced to restart – or pay $11bn

The Leopard review – this sultry Italian drama will leave you swooning

Netflix’s adaptation of the classic novel isn’t just a steamy, sumptuous treat that’s packed with nice food. It’s also a sharp look at how the ruling classes survive social upheaval

First the Americans came for British period drama. Now the Brits are getting their mitts on Italy’s heritage. In 2020, the US producer Shonda Rhimes sexed-up Regency England with lusty intrigue, soapy storylines and orchestral covers of pop hits to create Netflix’s smash-hit Bridgerton. This year, British screenwriters Benji Walters and Richard Worlow (The Serpent) and director Tom Shankland (SAS Rogue Heroes) are collaborating with the streamer on a bit of pop cultural colonisation of their own.

You can see why they would want to: The Leopard – the trio’s adaptation of Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa’s seminal 1860s novel, set in Sicily – is sumptuous, sensuous, emotionally tempestuous and full of nice food; all qualities our homegrown costume drama tends to lack. But this sweaty, steamy series is far more than a treat for the senses. Behind the frills and the romantic thrills – at the centre of the action is a captivating young love triangle – is a socio-historically insightful tale of an elite clan’s descent into obsolescence.

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Explained: what is China’s Two Sessions meeting?

The annual political gathering begins this week in Beijing, with the economy, tech and Donald Trump’s trade war high on the agenda

China’s annual Two Sessions meetings begins this week, with thousands of political and community delegates descending on Beijing from across mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau to ratify legislation, personnel changes and the budget over about two weeks of highly choreographed meetings.

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World’s biggest iceberg runs aground after a near-40-year journey from Antarctica

Scientists are studying whether the grounded A23a iceberg might help stir nutrients and make food more available for penguins and seals

The world’s biggest iceberg appears to have run aground roughly 70km (43 miles) from a remote Antarctic island, potentially sparing the crucial wildlife haven from being hit, a research organisation said Tuesday.

The colossal iceberg A23a – which measures roughly 3,300 sq km and weighs nearly 1tn tonnes – has been drifting north from Antarctica towards South Georgia island since 2020.

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Continue ReadingWorld’s biggest iceberg runs aground after a near-40-year journey from Antarctica