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View Full Version : If you could learn any random skill....


Ammi
20-10-2013, 06:19 AM
..what would you want it to be..?...

Jesus.
20-10-2013, 07:15 AM
To be able fix stuff. I have zero traditional man skills, yet my Da can fix/replace/create pretty much anything.

I have no idea where or why he learned to be able to do half the stuff he can, but I feel as though theres probably a mystical place that you're supposed to be sent away to in your early teens, and when you come back you have the ability to move plug sockets around the place.

Verbal
20-10-2013, 07:47 AM
To be able fix stuff. I have zero traditional man skills, yet my Da can fix/replace/create pretty much anything.

I have no idea where or why he learned to be able to do half the stuff he can, but I feel as though theres probably a mystical place that you're supposed to be sent away to in your early teens, and when you come back you have the ability to move plug sockets around the place.

I feel the exact same way, I think its a generational thing. For a lot of people today who are below 40 they would have spent most of their childhood playing video games, sat on PC's etc. Whereas in the 50s-80s they would play with toys that would encourage and build on more practical skills.

In 50 years we are all gonna be able to beat each other at angry birds but have no idea how to change a light bulb :joker:

Ammi
20-10-2013, 08:00 AM
To be able fix stuff. I have zero traditional man skills, yet my Da can fix/replace/create pretty much anything.

I have no idea where or why he learned to be able to do half the stuff he can, but I feel as though theres probably a mystical place that you're supposed to be sent away to in your early teens, and when you come back you have the ability to move plug sockets around the place.

...my dad was like that as well, he could pretty much do anything around the house and for other people as well..he would always say..'oh I'll do it for you, it's easy..'..if anyone said they had to have etc etc done...I'm not sure I appreciated how able he was as a child though..and we often think our dads are the cleverest people on earth so maybe I just thought that was 'normal'...what I was always impressed with though was whenever we went on holiday...if we say drove 350 miles to the destination or something...somehow and without an apparent use of a map..my dad always drove directly there and seemed to know exactly where he was going...(except for one 'Bath' incident..)...I was in awe of that both as a child and now...having to resort to a sat nav when I'm going somewhere I'm not familiar with...whenever we asked where we were going on holiday though, his answer was always..'a mystery tour'...and we camped/caravanned back in the day..so in theory, thinking about it now...maybe he never did know where he was going but just ended up somewhere and put the tent up sort of thing...while we thought he had some sort of magical direction powers....hmmmm...


....anyway, my OH is very good at most things as well...but he wasn't always..also 'back in the day' and when we first lived together, the first time we put up wallpaper was...well, it just wasn't really...but other than his DIY skills, he's always had this obsession/fascination of having to know how every electrical/technical thing works and I would always smile whenever we bought, say a new TV..?...because the first thing he would do when we got it home was to dismantle it, with bits everywhere..so that he could see what he would need to do if ever it broke...it freaked me seeing all these 'bits' on the floor but he always seemed to know where they went and put it all back together again...he did it with every electrical gadget/appliance...

..so if I could have a skill, maybe it would be that..to know more about how things work....

AnnieK
20-10-2013, 08:06 AM
...my dad was like that as well, he could pretty much do anything around the house and for other people as well..he would always say..'oh I'll do it for you, it's easy..'..if anyone said they had to have etc etc done...I'm not sure I appreciated how able he was as a child though..and we often think our dads are the cleverest people on earth so maybe I just thought that was 'normal'...what I was always impressed with though was whenever we went on holiday...if we say drove 350 miles to the destination or something...somehow and without an apparent use of a map..my dad always drove directly there and seemed to know exactly where he was going...(except for one 'Bath' incident..)...I was in awe of that both as a child and now...having to resort to a sat nav when I'm going somewhere I'm not familiar with...whenever we asked where we were going on holiday though, his answer was always..'a mystery tour'...and we camped/caravanned back in the day..so in theory, thinking about it now...maybe he never did know where he was going but just ended up somewhere and put the tent up sort of thing...while we thought he had some sort of magical direction powers....hmmmm...


....anyway, my OH is very good at most things as well...but he wasn't always..also 'back in the day' and when we first lived together, the first time we put up wallpaper was...well, it just wasn't really...but other than his DIY skills, he's always had this obsession/fascination of having to know how every electrical/technical thing works and I would always smile whenever we bought, say a new TV..?...because the first thing he would do when we got it home was to dismantle it, with bits everywhere..so that he could see what he would need to do if ever it broke...it freaked me seeing all these 'bits' on the floor but he always seemed to know where they went and put it all back together again...he did it with every electrical gadget/appliance...

..so if I could have a skill, maybe it would be that..to know more about how things work....

My dad is like that with driving now Ammi. If I am ever going anywhere he tells me how to get there, where to go if there is traffic and he seems to know every service station in the country. He also had a knack of finding me...I would ring up at 3am and say.."Dad, I'm near a phone box and there's a shop across the road and I've no taxi money" and somehow he would find me in record time every time....

Verbal
20-10-2013, 08:06 AM
...my dad was like that as well, he could pretty much do anything around the house and for other people as well..he would always say..'oh I'll do it for you, it's easy..'..if anyone said they had to have etc etc done...I'm not sure I appreciated how able he was as a child though..and we often think our dads are the cleverest people on earth so maybe I just thought that was 'normal'...what I was always impressed with though was whenever we went on holiday...if we say drove 350 miles to the destination or something...somehow and without an apparent use of a map..my dad always drove directly there and seemed to know exactly where he was going...(except for one 'Bath' incident..)...I was in awe of that both as a child and now...having to resort to a sat nav when I'm going somewhere I'm not familiar with...whenever we asked where we were going on holiday though, his answer was always..'a mystery tour'...and we camped/caravanned back in the day..so in theory, thinking about it now...maybe he never did know where he was going but just ended up somewhere and put the tent up sort of thing...while we thought he had some sort of magical direction powers....hmmmm...


....anyway, my OH is very good at most things as well...but he wasn't always..also 'back in the day' and when we first lived together, the first time we put up wallpaper was...well, it just wasn't really...but other than his DIY skills, he's always had this obsession/fascination of having to know how every electrical/technical thing works and I would always smile whenever we bought, say a new TV..?...because the first thing he would do when we got it home was to dismantle it, with bits everywhere..so that he could see what he would need to do if ever it broke...it freaked me seeing all these 'bits' on the floor but he always seemed to know where they went and put it all back together again...he did it with every electrical gadget/appliance...

..so if I could have a skill, maybe it would be that..to know more about how things work....

lol exactly this! I've used a sat nav to get around the city i've lived in my whole life. My father could just get in the car and drive to Lands End at the drop of a hat.

Ammi
20-10-2013, 08:33 AM
My dad is like that with driving now Ammi. If I am ever going anywhere he tells me how to get there, where to go if there is traffic and he seems to know every service station in the country. He also had a knack of finding me...I would ring up at 3am and say.."Dad, I'm near a phone box and there's a shop across the road and I've no taxi money" and somehow he would find me in record time every time....

...haha, where would we teenagers have been without dads/parents and their 'taxi cabs' Annie...and, it's incredible isn't it..before the invention of computers/google/sat navs...they always knew exactly where they were going/how long it would take to get there etc....

lol exactly this! I've used a sat nav to get around the city i've lived in my whole life. My father could just get in the car and drive to Lands End at the drop of a hat.


....the 'Bath' incident, Verbal was once when we were travelling from London to Wales....and somehow we ended up in Bath in a circular traffic system in the city centre...we were going with other people so there were quite a few cars following each other and as we all got more and more frustrated, every now and then we would all stop/have 'discussions' and someone would say..yeah, I know where we're going now, no worries just follow me...'..and the 'leader' would change to someone else..?...30 minutes or so later, we would end up right back to that 'discussion' point...I think it took around 4 hours to get out of Bath..?...

smudgie
20-10-2013, 09:00 AM
Sew.

As daft as it sounds I can't sew a button anything or take up a hem etc.

Good job we have a great seamstress just down the road.

thesheriff443
20-10-2013, 09:07 AM
juggling while riding a uni cycle