That’s why before any children visit my house, I take all of the sockets out of the walls and leave the bare wires dangling from the receptacle. You want to charge your phone? Take this outlet and screwdriver. Oh, got a bit fried? Lesson one: check the breaker before doing electrical work, idiot.
Good times! My current rental has no ground for any of the outlets and refused to admit it was an issue. I had to put in GFCIs on every circuit to make sure I don’t get killed by some random appliance.
I fixed this problem because I don’t want them to die in the bath tub but when they bought the house the ground wire was broken about 2 feet outside the house. Just hangin in the air lol.
Make mistakes in front of kids while doing this and show them it doesn’t have to be a big deal if they “fail”, as long as they’re failing safely (slipping and skinning your knuckles while trying to remove a bolt on a car for example).
My father once wanted to demonstrate the danger of alcohol in combination with fire. So he got a seemingly empty bottle of some high percentage stuff and held a lighter to the opening.
I don’t think getting massively burned on the thumb and having an enormous yellow burn blister for weeks was part of the plan. But it did help in getting the message across.
I was on a trip with my partner (I am female, partner is male), and when we got off the train to go home, we had a flat tire.
He is not handy at all, and got super flustered and frustrated and was going to call AAA, and I was like umm… you have a spare in here, right? Time to learn how to change a tire! Pop that trunk!
And so I made him do it, and walked him through how, and now he knows for next time, yay! I’ve also fixed his dishwasher, patched drywall, several other plumbing things, etc. only thing I wont touch for someone else is electric. I wont even do my own unless its a plug-in thing.
He, in turn, helped me with building my computer and doing various software stuff I could probably do on my own but didn’t know how.
So even if those skills aren’t super useful for you directly, you can and will use them with other people and you can pass on the knowledge. I mean I learned to change a tire as a very young adult, from an off-duty cop who stopped to help on the side of the highway. I knew the basics, but he showed me the full process. And since then I’ve taught two others, but haven’t needed it for myself.
My rule (and one from a buddy at work) is that in order to be allowed to drive alone my kids are going to be expected to explain to me how to change a tire, check basic fluids, and replace a headlamp/brakelamp.
I don’t care if they are physically capable of doing it (they are pretty petite girls and some people torque the hell out of lugbolts/nuts) but in case they ever require help from someone, they should be able to recognize if it is correctly done, or if the person is acting shady.
I love this approach. Learn so, if nothing else, you can teach others.
One of my first boyfriends showed me how to build a computer, he walked me through how to pick parts and check features, but I decided what to buy. When I had everything he showed me how to put it together and get it working.
Ten years later a different boyfriend’s laptop conked out. I got him his own set of tools and said “Time to learn how a computer works.”
A similar thing happened with me and my sister. We were riding with our then boyfriends somewhere and got a flat. Niether of the guys knew how to change it. Both my sister and I did. It was late, and a cop stopped to check on us, a lady cop, she laughed when we told her what was going on, taught both of them right then and there how to change the tire.
I also helped a younger girl change her tire for her in a parking lot, she was really greatful she didn’t have to call her dad.
This. So much this. And I want to break it down a bit and give my own experiences.
Years ago, I was teaching my then-girlfriend how to change her oil. We were broke 20-somethings, so paying for a place to do it was a costly option. She was kinda “meh” on the idea but went with it. The moment she really got into it, though, was when a random guy walked by and was so happy seeing a woman learning how to take care of cars and how he wished his girl would learn that. She got a sense of pride from it, and afterwards, when she realised she did it herself and saved a bunch of money… she was very proud of herself. Rightfully so.
A (former) friend of mine had bought her first house just a couple of years ago. (Kinda wish she hadn’t because the house is in rough shape, but then again, the rental market is maybe in a worse shape… only time will tell). Anywho, I visit her, and she shows me the house. Not a single smoke detector anywhere in the house. No fire extinguishers anywhere. And in the living room, there was this fancy light fixture that was controlled by a dimmer switch… that was extremely hot. I think it was 6-8 bulbs (don’t recall) and each was 120w incandescent lightbulb… all through a dimmer. Unsure when the previous owner did that, but that’s a decent way to eventually cause a fire. The dimmer switch was literally hot to the touch. She knew it was hot, but didn’t really think anything of it. I took us to Home Depot/Menards/Fleet Farm (I don’t recall which exactly) and bought her a bunch of smoke detectors, extinguishers, and a new dimmer switch, which I installed, and we removed half the bulbs. Believe I also gave her a GFCI tester and told her to test every receptacle in the house.
Back in high school, I took a small engines course because I wanted to better know how engines really worked outside of a book. My station partner was a girl I knew (who lived a few houses down from me). One day I realised I was hogging everything (teardown and rebuild) and apologised and pushed everything to her. She pushed it back, said her brothers would do anything she ever needed, and she just wanted an easy course. (While this is not important to the story, it was a very unattractive move on her part, which did alter how I saw her, which, a few years later, when she asked me out, I rejected her.) Another course I took, which was an intro to welding, there was a girl who thought I’d do her work for her. I took to acetylene welding right away, which seemed to be the hardest for everyone else (hence why she picked me). Instead, I told her I’d help teach her, which she took me up on. The unbridled joy and pride when she got an A on her welding test… (a memory that leaves with me).
Final story, I was in college, and my roommate was a loser. He had no fucking idea how to cook. He tried to make Mac and Cheese once and didn’t know how to boil water. He had no idea how the washer/dryer worked. His mom asked if I’d teach him. And I did try, but he had no plans to learn; he’d rather drive the 2-3 hours back home to make his mom do his laundry. Or if he couldn’t make it that week, he’d just buy new clothes.
All kids should be taught all sorts of basic skills. And frankly, a bunch of adults could stand to learn things too. Example, do you know what an anode rod is? If not, I’m guessing you’ve been skipping out on maintenance. Do you know if your heater is gas/electric? And which one has a pilot light? Do you have a spare tire? Where is it? Have you ever used the jack on your car before? What are jumper cables and do you have some? How do they work and how do you use them correctly? Every adult should be able to answer all these questions and more.
I saw that yesterday. I tried to explain to my wife how absurd it is that the same 64GB RAM kit I bought a few months ago for $210 is currently over $760.
Yeah it’s mental. I’ve been thinking about building a dedicated gaming rig to play older multiplayer stuff via steam stream since my proxmox box has an older Xeon chip, but I’ll be damned at these prices.
Just last week I finally set and held a boundary for my ex. I did NOT unclog her toilet. She figure it out . Now she has her own toilet snake and knows how to use it
And don’t forget to teach all the kids how to fix an electrical socket, change a tire, build a computer.
That’s why before any children visit my house, I take all of the sockets out of the walls and leave the bare wires dangling from the receptacle. You want to charge your phone? Take this outlet and screwdriver. Oh, got a bit fried? Lesson one: check the breaker before doing electrical work, idiot.
The survivors go directly to trade school.
That sounds like a lot of work. Just do like my parents did and buy a house that has all the electrical outlets red flagged and never fix them!
Good times! My current rental has no ground for any of the outlets and refused to admit it was an issue. I had to put in GFCIs on every circuit to make sure I don’t get killed by some random appliance.
I fixed this problem because I don’t want them to die in the bath tub but when they bought the house the ground wire was broken about 2 feet outside the house. Just hangin in the air lol.
And place the hungry chihuahua in front of the circuit breaker. That way they learn to tame a dog and find the right switch. #twofer
Make mistakes in front of kids while doing this and show them it doesn’t have to be a big deal if they “fail”, as long as they’re failing safely (slipping and skinning your knuckles while trying to remove a bolt on a car for example).
My father once wanted to demonstrate the danger of alcohol in combination with fire. So he got a seemingly empty bottle of some high percentage stuff and held a lighter to the opening.
I don’t think getting massively burned on the thumb and having an enormous yellow burn blister for weeks was part of the plan. But it did help in getting the message across.
Genuinely good advice.
I was on a trip with my partner (I am female, partner is male), and when we got off the train to go home, we had a flat tire.
He is not handy at all, and got super flustered and frustrated and was going to call AAA, and I was like umm… you have a spare in here, right? Time to learn how to change a tire! Pop that trunk!
And so I made him do it, and walked him through how, and now he knows for next time, yay! I’ve also fixed his dishwasher, patched drywall, several other plumbing things, etc. only thing I wont touch for someone else is electric. I wont even do my own unless its a plug-in thing.
He, in turn, helped me with building my computer and doing various software stuff I could probably do on my own but didn’t know how.
So even if those skills aren’t super useful for you directly, you can and will use them with other people and you can pass on the knowledge. I mean I learned to change a tire as a very young adult, from an off-duty cop who stopped to help on the side of the highway. I knew the basics, but he showed me the full process. And since then I’ve taught two others, but haven’t needed it for myself.
My rule (and one from a buddy at work) is that in order to be allowed to drive alone my kids are going to be expected to explain to me how to change a tire, check basic fluids, and replace a headlamp/brakelamp.
I don’t care if they are physically capable of doing it (they are pretty petite girls and some people torque the hell out of lugbolts/nuts) but in case they ever require help from someone, they should be able to recognize if it is correctly done, or if the person is acting shady.
I love this approach. Learn so, if nothing else, you can teach others.
One of my first boyfriends showed me how to build a computer, he walked me through how to pick parts and check features, but I decided what to buy. When I had everything he showed me how to put it together and get it working.
Ten years later a different boyfriend’s laptop conked out. I got him his own set of tools and said “Time to learn how a computer works.”
A similar thing happened with me and my sister. We were riding with our then boyfriends somewhere and got a flat. Niether of the guys knew how to change it. Both my sister and I did. It was late, and a cop stopped to check on us, a lady cop, she laughed when we told her what was going on, taught both of them right then and there how to change the tire.
I also helped a younger girl change her tire for her in a parking lot, she was really greatful she didn’t have to call her dad.
God I wish I knew how to do any of that. Thankfully there’s[email protected] to teach me that now
This. So much this. And I want to break it down a bit and give my own experiences.
Years ago, I was teaching my then-girlfriend how to change her oil. We were broke 20-somethings, so paying for a place to do it was a costly option. She was kinda “meh” on the idea but went with it. The moment she really got into it, though, was when a random guy walked by and was so happy seeing a woman learning how to take care of cars and how he wished his girl would learn that. She got a sense of pride from it, and afterwards, when she realised she did it herself and saved a bunch of money… she was very proud of herself. Rightfully so.
A (former) friend of mine had bought her first house just a couple of years ago. (Kinda wish she hadn’t because the house is in rough shape, but then again, the rental market is maybe in a worse shape… only time will tell). Anywho, I visit her, and she shows me the house. Not a single smoke detector anywhere in the house. No fire extinguishers anywhere. And in the living room, there was this fancy light fixture that was controlled by a dimmer switch… that was extremely hot. I think it was 6-8 bulbs (don’t recall) and each was 120w incandescent lightbulb… all through a dimmer. Unsure when the previous owner did that, but that’s a decent way to eventually cause a fire. The dimmer switch was literally hot to the touch. She knew it was hot, but didn’t really think anything of it. I took us to Home Depot/Menards/Fleet Farm (I don’t recall which exactly) and bought her a bunch of smoke detectors, extinguishers, and a new dimmer switch, which I installed, and we removed half the bulbs. Believe I also gave her a GFCI tester and told her to test every receptacle in the house.
Back in high school, I took a small engines course because I wanted to better know how engines really worked outside of a book. My station partner was a girl I knew (who lived a few houses down from me). One day I realised I was hogging everything (teardown and rebuild) and apologised and pushed everything to her. She pushed it back, said her brothers would do anything she ever needed, and she just wanted an easy course. (While this is not important to the story, it was a very unattractive move on her part, which did alter how I saw her, which, a few years later, when she asked me out, I rejected her.) Another course I took, which was an intro to welding, there was a girl who thought I’d do her work for her. I took to acetylene welding right away, which seemed to be the hardest for everyone else (hence why she picked me). Instead, I told her I’d help teach her, which she took me up on. The unbridled joy and pride when she got an A on her welding test… (a memory that leaves with me).
Final story, I was in college, and my roommate was a loser. He had no fucking idea how to cook. He tried to make Mac and Cheese once and didn’t know how to boil water. He had no idea how the washer/dryer worked. His mom asked if I’d teach him. And I did try, but he had no plans to learn; he’d rather drive the 2-3 hours back home to make his mom do his laundry. Or if he couldn’t make it that week, he’d just buy new clothes.
All kids should be taught all sorts of basic skills. And frankly, a bunch of adults could stand to learn things too. Example, do you know what an anode rod is? If not, I’m guessing you’ve been skipping out on maintenance. Do you know if your heater is gas/electric? And which one has a pilot light? Do you have a spare tire? Where is it? Have you ever used the jack on your car before? What are jumper cables and do you have some? How do they work and how do you use them correctly? Every adult should be able to answer all these questions and more.
I really wish someone taught me to build a computer
It’s like LEGO but with sharper edges.
Ah, the good old days of cheap cases, when every build took a blood sacrifice.
Good old days like yesterday.
Seriously, good luck finding one without a jagged metal edge waiting in eager anticipation for your supple flesh.
I wanted to write: No better time to get started than now!
But looking at the RAM prices which are about to jump over to GPUs, maybe wait till after the AI bubble bursts.
32GB of DDR5 is north of $400, yeah might be best to wait.
I saw that yesterday. I tried to explain to my wife how absurd it is that the same 64GB RAM kit I bought a few months ago for $210 is currently over $760.
Yeah it’s mental. I’ve been thinking about building a dedicated gaming rig to play older multiplayer stuff via steam stream since my proxmox box has an older Xeon chip, but I’ll be damned at these prices.
So first you melt some sand…
Also mending, how to do laundry, plus how and when to compromise.
My daughter always helps me with oil changes. We love it.
Plunging a toilet, cleaning a toilet.
Just last week I finally set and held a boundary for my ex. I did NOT unclog her toilet. She figure it out . Now she has her own toilet snake and knows how to use it
Writing the theme tune, singing the theme tune.
Instructions unclear my dick is now stuck in the toilet
It is all about the pull, not the push.