100 Skills That I Should Know

Tomorrow is my birthday and both of my sons will celebrate theirs in the next two weeks. I should get started on making sure they know all of these. Seen on Buzz Feed and kottke, from Popular Mechanics. There's a quiz there also. I've put in bold the ones in the list that I feel I have the skill.

Automotive

1. Handle a blowout
2. Drive in snow
3. Check trouble codes - although my middle name is trouble . . .
4. Replace fan belt
5. Wax a car - "wax on, wax off"
6. Conquer an off-road obstacle
7. Use a stick welder
8. Hitch up a trailer
9. Jump start a car - so far, so good

Handling Emergencies

10. Perform the Heimlich
11. Reverse hypothermia - ooh, body heat!
12. Perform hands-only CPR - is that the Bee Gees I hear?
13. Escape a sinking car

Home

14. Carve a turkey - something I learned from my father
15. Use a sewing machine - if I have to
16. Put out a fire - heh, heh, fire
17. Home brew beer
18. Remove bloodstains from fabric
19. Move heavy stuff - remember lift with the knees, not with the back!
20. Grow food
21. Read an electric meter
22. Shovel the right way - remember lift with the knees, not with the back!
23. Solder wire
24. Tape drywall
25. Split firewood
26. Replace a faucet washer - call the plumber, right?
27. Mix concrete
28. Paint a straight line - except while drinking
29. Use a French knife - I'd have to know what a French knife is, but I'm not usually supposed to touch sharp things. Someday I'll tell you about the scar on my wrist.
30. Prune bushes and small trees - well I can prune, but is it right?
31. Iron a shirt - used to do it all the time, now I just put on a sweater over it.
32. Fix a toilet tank flapper
33. Change a single-pole switch
34. Fell a tree
35. Replace a broken windowpane
36. Set up a ladder, safely
37. Fix a faucet cartridge
38. Sweat copper tubing
39. Change a diaper - um, yeah
40. Grill with charcoal - but I prefer the gas
41. Sew a button on a shirt - sure, and most times it won't come off again
42. Fold a flag - every day when I worked at the public library, we had to go out and get the flag and fold it

Medical Myths

43. Treat frostbite
44. Treat a burn
45. Help a seizure victim
46. Treat a snakebite - this of course, leads to this joke
47. Remove a tick

Military Know-How

48. Shine shoes
49. Make a drum-tight bed
50. Drop and give the perfect pushup

Outdoors

51. Run rapids in a canoe
52. Hang food in the wild
53. Skipper a boat
54. Shoot straight
55. Tackle steep drops on a mountain bike
56. Escape a rip current

Primitive Skills

57. Build a fire in the wilderness
58. Build a shelter
59. Find potable water

Surviving Extremes

60. Floods
61. Tornadoes
62. Cold
63. Heat
64. Lightning

Teach Your Kids

65. Cast a line
66. Lend a hand
67. Change a tire
68. Throw a spiral - Nelson Rockefeller, Jr. likes to tell a story about how his father told him the only way to throw a good spiral meant you had to take off your overcoat.
69. Fly a stunt kite
70. Drive a stick shift
71. Parallel park
72. Tie a bowline
73. Tie a necktie
74. Whittle
75. Ride a bike

Technology

76. Install a graphics card
77. Take the perfect portrait
78. Calibrate HDTV settings
79. Shoot a home movie
80. Ditch your hard drive

Master Key Workshop Tools - as mentioned earlier, I'm not allowed to use power tools unsupervised unless 911 is on speed dial

81. Drill driver
82. Grease gun
83. Coolant hydrometer
84. Socket wrench
85. Test light
86. Brick trowel
87. Framing hammer
88. Wood chisel
89. Spade bit
90. Circular saw
91. Sledge hammer
92. Hacksaw
93. Torque wrench
94. Air wrench
95. Infrared thermometer
96. Sand blaster
97. Crosscut saw
98. Hand plane
99. Multimeter
100. Feeler gauges