Basic Life Skills People Never Learned

There are basic life skills that most people have a handle on. Tying your shoes, riding a bike, and reading a clock all rank among them. But if we are honest with ourselves, which we normally are on Twitter for some reason, we all have at least one skill that we totally should know how to do but definitely do not. People are sharing their "life skill blind spots" on this hilarious Twitter thread, and now we can all feel a little less alone.

Jenée Desmond-Harris, an editor at The New York Times, started off the thread by sharing that her landlord, a very smart person with a STEM education from a very prestigious school, doesn't know how to open a combination lock. She explains that he didn't go to middle or high school in the U.S. You don't think about it, but if that's something you're never taught, you will never learn it! She asked others to share their "life skill blind spots," and so many people delivered.

Ummmmmmmm... I also do this. I didn't realize this was like, the "modified" version of putting a bra on. I just thought that's how you did it and that hooking your bra behind your back was reserved for witches and movie characters. I think it's too late for me. I'll be a hook-and-spinner for life at this point.

This is adorable. Most little kids look like this when they're trying to wink, but then, they grow up, gain increased control over the muscles in their face, and learn to do it properly. Not this woman! I hope she never learns because this is the cutest. Also, people who genuinely wink in real life are creepers, so it's for the best.

This is so funny to me. Hey, bunny ears is a perfectly valid way to tie your shoes. I just don't know any grown adult who does it that way. In fact, I've tried bunny ears as an adult, and it just doesn't work as well! The other method is pretty much half-bunny ears, so he's already halfway there!

I have never and will never know how to open and close any type of shade properly. I just spin and spin until it does what I want or the opposite of what I want, in which case I spin the other way. I have never before today heard "Right for light" and "Left for late." It makes so much sense it's making me angry.

Part of me thinks it's still important for kids to learn how to tell time on analog clocks because like, what if the world ends and all the digital clocks go out? But then again, if that happens, what will you need time for anyway? Time is a construct. Time is a flat circle. Time means nothing.

I have to say, this is a very effective method for distinguishing right and left and if you have to do it, do it instead of potentially getting things wrong. My fiancé has a habit of saying "right" when he means "left" and vice versa when I'm driving and he's giving me directions. As such, I've become an expert at last-minute lane switches, but if he'd just use the thumb rule, I wouldn't have to risk our lives. 

Not being able to snap isn't that big a deal...unless of course your kid can snap and mercilessly makes fun of you for not being able to. If there's one thing every parent should have, it's complete and utter dominance over their spawn. Parents didn't bring children into this world for those children to laugh at them for not being able to snap.

I can't whistle either. I'm serious. I'm trying right now. At most, I end up sounding like a tea kettle when the water is just starting to get hot enough for it to whistle but now quite. Some people in this thread lamented that they couldn't do the whistle thing when you put your fingers in your mouth, but I'm talking about plain ol' pucker your lips and blow whistling. Can't do it. 

Unless you are Marie Kondo, the master of tidying up, you probably don't know how to fold a fitted sheet. Oh sure, I fold my fitted sheets. They end up smaller than they were at the beginning. But I don't know how to fold with any consistent pattern so it looks like a regular, squarely folded item. That's witchcraft!

This one is so funny to me, just mushing the cards around the table. I distinctly remember sitting down and trying to teach myself how to learn to shuffle cards. It was a skill that I was determined to learn, and I did! But it definitely took actual practice. 

Tying a tie is one of those things that shouldn't be as difficult as it, one of those things that at least for me, I have to look up how to do every single time I attempt to do it. As someone who doesn't often wear neckties, I haven't had to do it a lot, but I just know that if I did wear neck ties, I'd have to look at a tutorial every single time.

Here's the thing; almost no one is good at small talk. Small talk sucks. I say stop trying to get good at small talk and just have genuine conversations with people instead. It won't always work. It will still occasionally be awkward. But if you take the pressure of small talk away, then you don't have to worry about it!

Ironing is so silly. I mean, I guess I understand that sometimes you have to do it. But it almost never completely works and unless you are an ironing champion, you probably end up with creases in places you didn't expect or want. I say let's wear wrinkly shirts proudly and make ironing a think of the past.

This is precious. Learning to ride a bike is difficult, but more important than learning to ride a bike is learning to stop the bike and dismount without hurting yourself or others. And that's the part that people never focus on when they're teaching you to ride.