Doing new things. To give just one example, I have never ridden public transportation. If I needed to take a bus somewhere, I would have no idea how to find which one I needed, how to pay for it, how to get home again, etc. There are lots of things like that which everyone knows how to do, but I never had any reason to find out, and if I ever do, I’ll be too embarrassed to admit I don’t know about.
The other thing I suck at is asking for help. If I had to move a piano up a flight of stairs, I’d rather try to rig some kind of rope and pulley system and do it on my own than ask for assistance. I do ask for advice here, sometimes, but only because y’all don’t know who I am.
I could probably come up with many answers, but among the more conspicuous of the things I suck at:
add me to the list of the directionally dyslexic. Points of the compass mean nothing to me and I certainly have no idea which way is North or any other direction. Given any 50:50 decision such as ‘turn left or right’ I will assuredly choose the wrong way, even if I try to factor this tendency into my decision. I can’t give directions to anywhere I know how to get to, because I never absorb anything like street names or road numbers. I just get there by ‘feel’ and a vague memory of which way to drive.
arguing. There are lots of reasons why I more or less never argue with anyone about anything, but among them is the fact that I’m hopeless at it. I can never think of the right point to make at the right time, and the term ‘l’esprit d’escalier’ could have been coined just for me (it means thinking of the right retort way too late for it to be useful). Conversely, it seems everyone I have ever tried arguing with has always managed to come out with some point or piece of reasoning which I know is wrong or doesn’t add up… but at the time I can’t quite articulate where the flaw lies. Hence I always lose.
understanding musical theory. Throughout my education I was blessed with good, wise, enthusiastic music teachers. I’ve worked with musicians and singers. I have read good, well-written books that explain music theory in clear, easy-to-grasp terms. I have had the rudiements of key signatures, scales etc. explained to me countless times in my life, and none of it has ever stuck. To me, it’s still all nonsensical gibberish. Whatever bit of the brain is supposed to make sense if it all is just plain missing from mine.
Wow, same as me! And I’ve played several instruments professionally for 30 years! Just show me how the song goes and I’ll play it back to you. As for the sheet music, it might as well be hieroglyphics, for all I know about it.
Writing. I have a very hard time writing anything, and part of the reason I’ve actually started posting more to these boards is to get past my abject fear of writing. I don’t think I’ve ever written anything more than a handful of paragraphs long that isn’t technical documentation.
Anything requiring me to follow an outside rythym. Marching when I went through Basic was difficult enough, let’s not speak of dancing or singing ( where I can’t get the key right either)
OTOH I do not suck at logical problem solving, complex systems design, or explaining technical issues to non-technical people (just don’t ask me to write it down).
Sense of direction - I have an abysmal sense of direction. The only reason I’m not totally hopeless when driving around is because once I drive the same route about 50 times, I finally remember it. This causes some conflict with my friend when we are going somwhere- he clearly knows there is a faster way to get there, but I will always stick with the most FAMILIAR route. I also will ALWAYS pick the wrong direction in a “is it left or right?” situation :mad:
Bad singer- I can’t carry a tune, which is embarassing considering my mom teaches vocals. I really don’t like the sound of my own voice in general, though, so I’m not enthusiastic about learning to sing is annoying to me no matter how on-key I am
School- Unless something is really fascinating to me, I will have nearly zero motivation to do it. I don’t care what my parents claim, I find work MUCH more interesting that school 90% of the time. I hate studying, I hate reading boring information, I hate having to memorize things because my brain can’t process it because it is so damn boring.
When I was in elementary school, we received grades for “Written Communication” and “Oral Communication”, as well as reading, math, science, and history. The usual grades were letter grades: A, B, C, etc.
I once received a grade of “N/A – Not Applicable” for Written Communication. I kid you not.
Heh, I almost agree with that. However, I have tried to learn math my entire life. I am so bad at it that I have trouble using a calculator. Anything more than very simple math is all but impossible for me.
I really have tried and tried. I took Math 125 three times in college and finally passed with a D-. It was the worst grade of my entire college career.
I can’t landscape and I suck at interior decorating. My sister-in-law can pick up five cheap accessories from T.J. Maxx, put them on her mantle along with some freaking dried leaves and it looks awesome. I pick up five cheap accessories and put them on the mantle with some dried leaves and it looks like a windstorm blew through the house and left a bunch of crap in its wake.
I’ve also been told by my brother to NEVER pick up another paint brush, so I apparently suck at painting.
Financial stuff. I’m good at math, but I have absolutely no idea how economics work. The stock market may as well be written in Chinese. I don’t know what those numbers mean.
I don’t know how putting money in a bank gets interest. I don’t know what the rate means. I don’t understand why I have to pay more money later.
I tried the stock market and lost virtually everything I invested. I now have a money market account and a couple of retirement accounts, and I assume they make money, because my current balance is slightly higher than the last one. I don’t know from whcih magical fairyland the new money came, and I don’t which magic fairyland takes it away.
Handwriting. It’s always been bad. But now that I’ve been typing on computers for most of my working life, you can’t even call it writing anymore.
Math tests. I’ve almost always found that I could easily grasp the material and follow along with the lecture. But come the test, I don’t do well. Oh well, I think the last time I attempted a math course, I didn’t have time to study as much as I needed to.
Painting. I can draw with a pen or pencil. I can even produce a fairly convincing rendering of such things as a partly filled glass of water. I dabble in oil painting, and occasionally have produced a presentable work, but generally my efforts end up looking like “coloring” rather than “painting”.
I’ll come back with more examples as they come to me.
I identify with so many things here, it’s unnerving. I started to post individual replies and then realized that the outcome would be Sat on Cookie = Village Idiot.
What was Math 125, if you don’t mind my asking? In the universities I’ve attended, a three-digit course number was always at least upper division, so 125 sounds fairly advanced to me. If you squeaked by in Math 125, and that course is “Differential Geometry” or “Numerical Methods for Partial Differential Equations”, then you don’t suck at math.
I’m more than willing to bet it’s an intro class. Most colleges courses I know of are numbered 100-400 or 400-700. My school was one of the latter, and I got a D in my only required (400 level) math class :dubious:
I also suck at remembering phone numbers. I can’t look one up and look to the phone without forgetting. I think it is because phone numbers and names are essentially random. I can only remember what I can organize in my little mind’s filing cabinets.
That pretending thing is hard for me, in part because I care about most things. But start talking about knitting or something, and watch what happens.
I cannot wrap presents. I don’t know why. When it comes to wrapping presents, I can try to imitate my wife EXACTLY, do precisely what she is doing, but it is as if the paper works against me. I have tried and tried, wrapped HUNDREDS of presents, and I am not one iota better at it than I ever was. It’s frustrating. I’m good at other fine motor skills - I can sew, I can draw, whatever you ask. But I can’t wrap presents.
I can’t do pushups. I’ve been trying for the two years I’ve been training in tae kwon do, and I still have to do them from my knees, at half the pace of the rest of the class. It pisses me off every single time. Lifting small weights didn’t help. Doing pushups doesn’t help. I am doomed.
I can’t lie. It’s not that I’m so moral and upstanding that I won’t, it’s that if I try, you can tell, easily. If you want to make my best friend from high school laugh, ask her about the time I tried to lie to her. Years later, she’ll know exactly what you’re talking about, and still finds it funny.
My handwriting is nearly illegible, and continues to go downhill.
I get my ass kicked routinely in sparring. I have no real fighting instincts. I will stand there while you kill me. In fact, I will probably help you by moving in the direction you want me to move.
