I’m 34 and can’t swallow a pill larger than a birth control pill without breaking it into smaller pieces. And then only if I take it with a carbonated beverage (the fizz “hides” the pill). I just can not make my throat open for a pill. I know it’s all in my head and that almost every single mouthful of food I swallow is larger than any pill on the market, I still can not do it. It’s a huge psychological block I don’t think I’ll ever get past.
I think I’m going to hold the First Annual West Koast KrispyDope in my kitchen. All you experts are hereby demanded to show up and provide a cite as to the quality of your Treats.
Oh, I forgot - one of my friends in high school did not know how to play Pac Man. (We were kids of the 80’s, recall.) And it’s not like the rest of us had had a lot of contact with arcade games - Pac Man is intuitive, right? It’s obvious. She thought you were supposed to chase the ghosts down and eat them, that that was the point of the game, without eating the big dots or anything.
Many (and I mean MANY) of my mother’s friends were shocked as hell when I was surprised they didn’t know how to change a tire. “But why would I need to?” Argh. So these ladies grew up before cel phones, and they were just going to wait until some nice man stopped and changed their tires? Well, yes. That’s exactly what. Well, why don’t you learn now? All you have to do is read your owner’s manual. “It might roll over me!” Sigh. Even my mom was embarassed at them.
But, h aving been a little girl who spent her time in the living room with the guys and the game and the beer instead of in the kitchen with the ladies, when I suddenly had to fend for myself in college I found myself ignorant of a few basic cooking facts:
- Eggs stick to the pan.
- Oil for frying gets really, really, REALLY hot and you can’t tell it until you drop something in it.
- Hi, Opal. There is no 3 - I had known how to cook certain things before I left, because that’s what I made for myself at home, but when it came to branching out there were certain fine points of which I was ignorant.
I can’t do the finger-whistle either. I’d love to know how.
Missed the “or until tender” part, huh? On the other hand, I don’t like angel hair (I can barely stand "thin spaghetti) so I don’t have to worry about cooking it.
As to the OP: sometimes people are confused when visiting another country in which the floors are numbered differently. For example, what Americans consider the first floor is really the ground floor. I had that problem in England - I was always lost on the elevator because the first floor there is what I thought was the second floor - which may explain those people’s confusion in Canada, for example, if they were on the Canadian “first floor” but wanted to go down to their “first floor” and kept pressing the “1,” the door would continue to open.
And for the best “boiled eggs” don’t actually boil them. Hard-boiling eggs is an art form. For example, fresh eggs make lousy boiled eggs (the whites stick to the shell; very difficult to peel); use eggs a couple weeks old at least. Put a small hole in the large end of the egg with the point of a nail, puncturing the shell membrane. This will let the air out so it wont expand and crack the shell. Put the eggs in a sauce pan with enough cold water to cover the eggs (air should bubble out the little hole). Put the pan on the stove and turn on the burner to high heat. When the water *reaches * a large-bubble boil, take it off the stove and cover the pan with a lid for 15 minutes. Then dump out the hot water and immediately cover the eggs with cold water. Dump that water out and cover with cold water again. Leave the eggs in cold water until you can pick them up with your fingers. This method keeps the yolks from getting that grey covering.
Yes, I probably have done Easter eggs far too often - but when only the best will do … 
My SIL can’t understand how to use a measuring cup. And she gets tablespoons a teaspoons mixed up.
Sorry if these have already been mentioned (I haven’t read the whole thread yet): I can’t ride a bike, I can’t fold fitted sheets, and I can’t tie a balloon. Actually, anything that requires much manual dexterity at all I can’t do.
Oh, God! When I was learning to cook (fairly late in life), I didn’t know the difference between a clove of garlic and a head of garlic. I made a gazpacho once and the recipe called for six cloves of garlic and I put in six heads, which probably came to something like 36 cloves of garlic. My God, was that potent!
OK, lessee:
change a diaper – check
plan an invasion – nope
butcher a hog – yep
conn a ship – does a day-sailer count?
design a building – um… you might not want to stand under it
write a sonnet – sure (You didn’t say it had to be good)
balance accounts – check (not many of those these days 
)
build a wall – un-huh
set a bone – and control bleeding, and maintain an airway, and treat for shock.
comfort the dying – yes
take orders – all the time
give orders – yeah, that too
cooperate – of course
act alone – if required
solve equations – no problem
analyze a new problem – yep
pitch manure – many a ton
program a computer – it’s my living
cook a tasty meal – not bad, if I do say so myself
fight efficiently – not had to do a lot of that
die gallantly – I hope so, if and when it becomes necessary
on balance, not too bad.
Regarding the elevator issues-
I used to work at a Pharmaceutical company’s research division. We had quite a number of PhDs there, and sometimes, you would see someone in the elevator, with the doors open, then closed, and then open again, and so on! It was a two floor building, so getting mixed up on what floor you were on was quite unlikely. I often thought the elevator should just have one floor selector button marked “the other floor”. It seems that the more “higher education” that went into a brain, the less “normal stuff” would be left. There was some guy (or really weird woman) who would pee all over the floor in front of the urinal. Once, the puddle covered at least 25-30 square feet. Usually it was a small puddle, but still, wouldn’t a normal person just sit on the porcelain appliance, and let gravity do it’s thing?
A person should always know where their pee is going, that’s what I say!
As for me, I have a “Joy of Cooking” book that almost exclusively is used to figure out how to cook hard boiled eggs. I always forget how many minutes go by after the water starts to boil.
This floors me. How many possible different ways could someone use such a device, other than the right way?
Microwaving leftover pasta makes the texture weird. Plus, there will be hot and cold spots even if you stir it. The best way to reheat leftover pasta is to, put it in a bowl that’s alot bigger than the amount of pasta. Then pour boiling water over it and let it set for a couple of mins. It warms it back up without cooking it more.
Canadians use the same numbering system as the US. 5, 4, 3, 2, G.
She doesn’t understand the fractions, and that the lines that don’t have an amount next to them are also amounts. When her son was a baby, her husband had to mix the formula. And there were several trips to the ER, from giving the baby a tablespoon of medicine instead of a teaspoon.
Reason not to have kids?
Reason not to have kids?
Ditto. I found a text guide, but it was of little worth as I couldn’t understand exactly what they were conveying. Are there any picture guides on the net somewhere?
I have this problem too. I can add for sure, but just not very quickly. I’m getting better at it, but occasionally I find myself resorting to my fingers :smack: . This sucks big time. 7+8 gives me problems, don’t know exactly why? Some weird mathematical dyslexia methinks. Planning on a vegas trip, so I think I might review some addition tables. I feel like a freaking 1st. grader!
And Craps? Forget it, it seems like the biggest mystery in the world to me. I’ve pored over instructions but retain very little -something about 7 and 11 and making the point- have no idea how to bet on it. I always had problems with math in school (for some reason I’m pretty good at and actually enjoy algebra…go figure?).
To my eternal embarassment and stinging humiliation I was never able to climb a rope or do a pull-up in gym class, ever. (However, I can do one legged push-ups on my fists or fingertips.)
Guess there’s more ape than monkey recessed in my DNA!