I am with you.  One of my jobs when I was little was dusting and frankly, it doesn't happen nearly enough around here. 

My kids age 9 and 6 get an allowance which is not based on chores and adds up to $3 and $2.50/week respectively.  It is basically for the times when they want me to buy toys/candy at the store and I always say yes you can buy that for yourself.  Funny how priorities change when they have to pay for it.  OH and 10% goes to church and 10% to savings.  I say it is not based on chores however, every once in awhile when they don't get a chore done I charge them for the time it took me to complete it. 

There are so many ways to do allowance and so far I have found this works for us.  I would love to implement something like Kevyn Burger did where kids have to budget for their own personal items, but frankly I don't think I would stick to it in the end.  It seems to be a great way to teach kids about money though.  More power to folks who do it!