office wife

office wife
 n.— «Then there is the “office wife” role that the woman behind the typewriter or the data machine or the steno pad is somehow expected to perform…duties that never appear on a job description. A secretary must be a waitress, they say, who serves coffee and snacks to the boss; a personal shopper, who buys birthday presents for the wife; a nurse, who administers his eyedrops; a maid, who tends plants and dusts.» —“Secretaries See Parallels In ‘Nine To Five’” by Georgia Dullea New York Times Jan. 2, 1981. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)

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