What's up with the sock in the filing cabinet?

We've seen today's strip before, right? I actually thought that the Seattle Post-Intelligencer had messed up and repeated a strip. But no. Once again, it's just a case of someone insisting or being neat one place, but not another. We've seen it time and time again. The only thing that makes this even a little different is that this time, a husband is yelling at his wife! Excellent! I'm not really sure what kind of work Barfwell is referring to--cooking? I know I let my kitchen get a bit cluttered, but if I'm going to cook, then I clean up first. It's a wacky system I have.

The thing that gets me is that Mrs. Barfwell had to know that the home office was in that state--she probably watched it devolve to that point. And the second he got into it about the kitchen, she could've actually said something to shut him up instead of later just having the urge to vacuum his hide, which actually doesn't correspond to anything else in the strip--the state of the two rooms isn't one that calls for vacuuming so much as just straightening up in general.