During the week the literary gentleman "did" for himself.

That is to say, he emptied the tea leaves now and again into a jam jar set aside for that purpose, and if he ran out of clean forks he wiped over one or two on the roller towel.

Otherwise, as he explained to his friends, his "system" was quite simple, and he couldn't understand why people made all this fuss about housekeeping.
"You simply dirty everything you've got, get a hag in once a week to clean up, and the thing's done." The result looked like a gigantic dustbin.

Even the floor was littered with toast crusts, envelopes, cigarette ends.

But Ma Parker bore him no grudge.