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What "simple things" can't you do?

I can't whistle with any of the techniques that involve your fingers

6c56f0440d914f9093792d3a701844b9---life-hacks-lifehacks.jpg
Me neither.
 

Spenny

Member
I can't snap my fingers with my left hand. With the right it's a loud as fuck snap. With the left it's a fleshy thud.
 

A Fish Aficionado

I am going to make it through this year if it kills me
I grew up near the beach, but swimming is something you got to learn.

And also to avoid rip tides.

I'm nota great swimmer, but do yourself a favor.
 

Paracelsus

Member
I can't snap my fingers with my left hand. With the right it's a loud as fuck snap. With the left it's a fleshy thud.

That's entirely on the subject, it's the same for me except reversed. I'm right-handed but that's how it works. I can make a fist with my left foot, I can't do the same with the right one, etc.
 
Eat chicken or any meat on a bone. >_< I’m terrible at trying to cut meat off of its bone and when I try I waste half of it so I try to stick to boneless meat.

I also can’t swim in the least. Multiple meat drowning experiences when I was younger as well as my general fear of water over my head leads me to have no interest at all in learning.

Not that I’d ever want to but I’ve never been able to spit in my life.
 
Where do you guys live that can't swim? They should make that stuff mandatory in schools everywhere, can't imagine not being able to swim. And when you learn as a kid, you'll forever know how to do it.
 
Eat chicken or any meat on a bone. >_< I’m terrible at trying to cut meat off of its bone and when I try I waste half of it so I try to stick to boneless meat.

I also can’t swim in the least. Multiple meat drowning experiences when I was younger as well as my general fear of water over my head leads me to have no interest at all in learning.

Not that I’d ever want to but I’ve never been able to spit in my life.

I would like to hear more about these... &#128519;


I can't seem to exist without my addictive tendencies manifesting in some way. It sucks. At the moment vaping is my thing which is damage control to scratch the itch.
 
Can't open a beer bottle with a lighter

My wife can open a bottle with anything, I even saw her do it with the cardboard innards of a kitchen roll.

I've tried to do it with a lighter but either I can't do it or when I do the beer goes everywhere.

I can't drive, it's way too anxiety inducing for me. I don't trust myself to do what I have to do. My spatial awareness in general is quite poor so adding a car into the mix isn't ideal.

I've tried for a long time but just found it difficult.
 
I can't drive, but that's due to lack of effort. It looks simple enough to learn, I just can't be bothered sparing the time or money on it.
I can't talk on the phone easily. I get flustered, overthink basic questions, pace around the room and finish the conversation with 'see you later' when I'm talking to customer service people I'll never meet. Fuck talking on the phone.
 

Laieon

Member
I'm 27. Up until about 2 years ago I couldn't tie my shoes. My parents had tried to teach me, same with some teachers. The traditional bunny loop would just never click with me. After velcro shoes I just moved straight to slip on stuff (love me converse and vans). Wasn't until I came across a post on reddit for something called "the ninja knot" that I found something that actually worked for me.

Edit: Which just happens to be that way that's posted in the gif above, haha.

I also can't snap my fingers.

Is there a slower version or video of this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s8cTGP0nqaw
 
I can't wolf-whistle. Tried many, many times making different shapes with my mouth, tongue and fingers, but it just never works.

OP, I really don't think a Rubik's Cube is considered a 'simple thing' which is uncommon that people are unable to do. My mind cannot process block puzzles like that, including those sliding pictures which are mixed up with one part missing.

small talk with people my age

I'm not great at small talk, but in particular I cannot talk to any authority figure at work. I just clam up, I'm awkward and unable to behave normally. I have some kind of psychological block.
 
Handle money.

I'd live underneath a bridge if it weren't for my SO. A bridge with a shit load of electronics and video games, but a bridge nonetheless.
 

siddx

Magnificent Eager Mighty Brilliantly Erect Registereduser
The bicycle ones are blowing my mind. Maybe it's an age thing? If I couldn't ride a bike my childhood would have been misery, it was my primary mode of transportation for years, the only way I could go see my friends in my neighborhood. From kindergarten till 7th grade.

I am a great swimmer but for what ever reason, I never learnt how to dive. I was even on the swim team and did very well but I'd belly flop into the pool every race.

Oh and another for whistling with my fingers. I can whistle normally but I've tried with my fingers over and over andand over through the years with no success.
 

wetflame

Pizza Dog
I can't whistle with my fingers. I can swim, but I can't float. My wife laughs at me every time I try, my legs just start to drop down. It's better in the sea because saltwater's more buoyant, but in a pool it's not happening.
 
Make myself understood. Seems I excel at inadvertently getting others to disagree not with what I'm saying, but what they think I said, which is almost always quite different and makes further discussion impossible because I can't defend a point and deflect one I'm not even making at the same time. It's not like others seem to have this problem, at least to the same extent (as in my discussions cannot have any other outcome), so obviously it's a shortcoming on my part as opposed to something truly complicated. So yeah, it's a simple thing I really really suck at. It's not like I do it on purpose because it's depressingly isolating.

Edit: The punchline is that I want to become a writer, so this makes me the writer's equivalent of Elías García Martínez.
 
Make myself understood. Seems I excel at inadvertently getting others to disagree not with what I'm saying, but what they think I said, which is almost always quite different and makes further discussion impossible because I can't defend a point and deflect one I'm not even making at the same time. It's not like others seem to have this problem, at least to the same extent (as in my discussions cannot have any other outcome), so obviously it's a shortcoming on my part as opposed to something truly complicated. So yeah, it's a simple thing I really really suck at. It's not like I do it on purpose because it's depressingly isolating.

(Speaking of which, it'll be interesting to see what happens with this one.)

I actually understand what you mean, I think. I get that, especially when I'll have to communicate by writing. To me, the lack of any other reaction than words in a conversation is kinda unnerving. I used to take so long to reply to people on mmo's and such that the conversation would've moved on, simply because I tried to write in a manner that I am fully understood. In the end the answer either became too big and confusing or short and really diluted. But then I started mostly winging it and just accepted that some get me and some don't, I'd correct them if they thought way differently than what I meant. This is also why I don't really talk on chats and message boards, with Gaf being pretty much the only exception.
 

Thanks for that. The Ninja knot looks very simple to grasp and lightning fast, so I'll give it a try.

I can tie my shoelaces well but I still do it slowly in an idiosyncratic way I worked out for myself when I was accidentally placed in a higher year of infants after moving schools.

I see people saying stuff like they can't drive or solve Rubik's Cube. Those aren't simple activities. I mean, certainly, I mastered clutch control quickly, I can reverse around both tight and loose corners, I can do a three-point turn, I'm a demon at road sign recognition, I can change gear with ease, and I park very well. But I can't drive safely enough to pass the test. Fortunately for me, and most fortunately for all other road users, I've never needed to drive.
 

ZanDatsu

Member
I can't explain why I like something, or even clearly put thoughts into words in general. I can sit down and write it, but just getting words out on the fly is difficult for me. I don't stutter or have any speech issues, nor do I suffer with a lack of vocabulary. I'm just bad at clearly expressing myself. This leads to a cycle of me not even wanting to bother trying, meaning I don't improve on it and in turn am probably getting even worse with time.

Totally forgot an even more obvious one: I can't blow my nose.
 
tie knots that aren't for shoelaces, do any rudimentary kind of diy. anything that requires more the most basic hand eye co-ordination that ain't stuff that I've been doing most my life like vidya games and playing footy or stuff I've spent a shitload of time on like learning to drive or playing bass. Nothing ever comes natural to me.

have to empty out the cardboard and plastic out of the baler machines and move a pallet of empty crates from the warehouse out into the yard at work and haven't done one without help yet and it's been nearly a year, thank fuck my workplace is mostly chill -_-

can't whistle either.
 

chadtwo

Member
I can't whistle and I can only snap with my left hand. And even then, I don't snap the way you're supposed to, I just have hitchhiker's thumb so I have more leverage to work with.
 
Like other posters-can't drive(well without freaking out). Trying to remedy it by the end of the year though. Super embarrassed by it when people ask. Also never learned how to whistle.
 

gdt

Member
I have a hard time swallowing pills. Instant gag.

Nowadays I can buy it’s still a struggle.



I used to crush them up and put them in a drink.
 
This is the proper way though:

1104535.gif

Confession: This is the only way I know how to. I think I never really learned it as a kid because I always had shoes without laces. Then, in my teens I was too embarrassed to admit it to anybody who would be able to teach me. I searched online for tutorials but never could remember how to do it after a few hours. It was really late when I stumbled across this method in the internet and it's so easy and fast, it's incredible. I wonder why almost nobody knows it.
 

uceenk

Member
i can't drive a car
i can't ride motorbike

and with Uber and Grab everywhere, i have less motivation to learn to drive
 

Shadybiz

Member
I also cannot whistle.

I can't really back a car into a parking spot very well, either. I see double constantly, so my depth perception is fairly screwed up.
 
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