OT: - Things You Suck At Worse Than You Should | The Boneyard

OT: Things You Suck At Worse Than You Should

Chin Diesel

Chin Diesel

I've always been crazy but it's kept me from going
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It's May and in spite of others saying this will be a busy month, we are four days in and nothing newsworthy.

So, feel free to show some introspection and come clean with things you are worse at than just not being good at it.

For me it's pool/billiards. Might be the worst player I know at it. Not really sure why I'm bad at it either. Plenty of other hand/eye sports I can do well and there's nothing complicated to get average at playing the game. It's all geometry and physics with angles and spin. Sure, at higher levels there're players curving the cue ball and other whacky stuff but I can't even hit basic straight on shots or basic bank shots. I pick up a stick a few times a year at most but considering how many times I have played over the years I should be better than what I am at it.

The other thing I suck at is trying to start somewhat interesting offseason OT threads.
 
Excercize. I need it but can't manage to drag myself out of bed early during the week to get it done. I'm plenty active on weekends with yardwork and splitting wood and such but I have to somehow manage to get out of bed in the morning and get 30 minutes of something in.
 
I'm pretty decently athletic, nothing special but I have good hand-eye coordination and can catch and throw a baseball/football with no problems. For some reason though I can't get the motion of kicking a soccer ball/football down at all. I'm terrible at it. Played kickball for a few years and if I wasn't a good pitcher it wouldn't have worked out for me at all.
 
Chin Diesel said:
It's May and in spite of others saying this will be a busy month, we are four days in and nothing newsworthy.

So, feel free to show some introspection and come clean with things you are worse at than just not being good at it.

For me it's pool/billiards. Might be the worst player I know at it. Not really sure why I'm bad at it either. Plenty of other hand/eye sports I can do well and there's nothing complicated to get average at playing the game. It's all geometry and physics with angles and spin. Sure, at higher levels there're players curving the cue ball and other whacky stuff but I can't even hit basic straight on shots or basic bank shots. I pick up a stick a few times a year at most but considering how many times I have played over the years I should be better than what I am at it.

The other thing I suck at is trying to start somewhat interesting offseason OT threads.
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Golf. I wish I were better but never really had the time to learn how to swing properly. As in Billiards, it's all about technique so I'm sure lessons would be helpful. Someone gave me a few pointers about how to hold the cue stick properly and it helped a lot. All technique.

I have no musical talent whatsoever.

 
.-.
Kolumbo said:
Golf. I wish I were better but never really had the time to learn how to swing properly. As in Billiards, it's all about technique so I'm sure lessons would be helpful. Someone gave me a few pointers about how to hold the cue stick properly and it helped a lot. All technique.

I have no musical talent whatsoever.

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For me the comparison wouldn't even be regular golf. It would be like sucking at miniature golf where you have a straight putt and you miss wide by a foot.

I would suggest real golf with hills, hazards, wind, weather has way more variables than a stagnant pool table where the biggest obstacle is maybe a bottle of beer or ashtray along the table.
 
Sense of direction.

If I'm not driving, I don't really pay attention, so nothing sticks then; when I am driving, I follow directions slavishly, and then forget them almost instantly. And my natural instinct is almost always wrong.

Unlike most of my fellow males, however, I am not averse to asking for directions when I am lost.

These days the GPS and phone can eliminate a lot of the issues, but I have twice gotten pretty badly lost while going out for a morning run when we were traveling, because I don't bring my phone on runs. Once was in Rome, on the morning of our first full day there, and the language barrier added another level of difficulty. The other was in Baltimore, on my birthday. I had intended to do a four-mile run from our hotel and had charted a path on Map My Run, but obviously missed a turn or two. When I finally made it back and retraced my route, I had gone between eight and nine miles--by far the most I have ever run in my like. Adrenaline helped.
 
Racket sports. I was good at baseball. I have good hand eye coordination. But I can't play racket sports. I hit it on the handle all the time. I have no idea why.
 
Like a couple others said, golf. No consistency. For 9 holes I can shoot anywhere from 52-62. I'm not looking to be great, I just don't want to be the worst of my group, which I am. Under 50 is a miracle and a half. I'm trying something new this year and driving the ball better. Trying to see if it works for the irons as well. My Mother's Day gift to the wife is me leaving the house and golfing 9 at Rolling Greens in Rocky Hill Sunday. 53 last week, so I'm off to a decent start.
 
.-.
Making mashed potatoes. I'm a pretty good cook and know my way around the kitchen, but I cannot make decent mashed potatoes. They always suck - so much so that I don't even try anymore.

For sports, it's definitely shooting a basketball. I have a surprisingly good arm throwing a baseball. I can throw a spiral and both pool and golf are relatively strong suits. Even though I practiced for hours and hours as a kid, I never could get any accuracy shooting a basketball. Even layups are an issue.
 
.-.
In earnest, this is one my wife rags on me for all the time -- wrapping presents.

Part of it is my own indifference, but I really have zero intuition for where I'm supposed to be cutting/folding/taping the paper down, and the end result looks like a 5-year-old did it.
 
Blowing a bubble witt gum, tried for 20+ years and still hasn't happened.

Remembering people's names when I first meet them. Have a great memory with names eventually, but when I first meet someone I just forget to listen when they introduce themselves
 
Tenspro2002 said:
In earnest, this is one my wife rags on me for all the time -- wrapping presents.

Part of it is my own indifference, but I really have zero intuition for where I'm supposed to be cutting/folding/taping the paper down, and the end result looks like a 5-year-old did it.
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Wow. That's me too. Are you left handed by any chance?
 
Golf... Back in the day (before kids) I was.making the move to a single digit handicap... And now that the kids are gone, I am much older, I find that I cannot swing the stix like I used to, with the age-induced loss of distance and skill, because I have not played and practiced as regularly as I did before family time.
 
Throwing anything into a garbage waste bin. Does not matter how close or far or how big or small the receptacle I will
miss 90% of the time. I could be throwing banana peels, balled up paper, empty coffee cups or anything and I will usually miss.
You would think I would get better after all of these years, but I just suck at it. Plus whatever everyone else has written, I suck at to a greater or lesser extent.
 
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Basketball - I once was selected for the free throw competition on the court during an exhibition game at XL several years ago. I went like 3/11 (I had also drank a bottle of chapagne prior)

Gift Wrapping - for whatever reason, a skill I have never been able to master.
 
I suppose the obvious one for me is hearing, but I'm probably actually better at it than I should be, all things considered. That's small consolation to those who need to suffer through it with me. So I'll offer these.

Running. Even when I was a skinny middle school kid, I struggled to finish the required 10 minute mile. After 100 yards or so I can't breathe. Can run all day in shorter stretches, playing football or soccer.

Golf Iron play. I can putt. I can drive. I can chip. I can do the harder things and can't do the easier thing. I think my chipping is decent because I never hit greens.
 
Horseshoes. I could never get the one rotation "flip". Instead, it usually landed on the ends and went bouncing off into the woods. It got to be so embarrassing that at family picnics I would just sit it out.
For a while I was saved by the game "Jarts" which utilized missile type iron rods with plastic fins that you tried to throw underhand in a trajectory at a hoop so many feet away. Unfortunately for me that fell out of favor after a few years when some people who perhaps got distracted and wound up getting one coming down on the top of their heads or through their foot.

Also, just about anything mechanical that requires fixing. I often well understand the nature of the problem but forget about actually fixing it. I just find it hard to have any patience with it all. Just all thumbs with that.
 
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