I would add knowing how to grow food, or basic botany. I’m homeschooling my 11&8 yo boys and we have a similar list. My goal was that by they are 12, they know how to grow basic vegetables, raise a chick/turkey to maturity, slaughter it, and cook an entire meal (including side dishes) using that bird. My 11yo is nearly there (still needs help slaughtering), but they helped me cull our rabbits and I feel pretty confident they know how to do all of the above with it.
I’m a retired RN who left Chicago almost 6 yrs ago and I’ve learned all of these things myself, so they are benefiting watching me learn from mistakes. I’m also taking a deep dive into anatomy (it helps when we cull various animals) and will be teaching them the basics of starting an IV, using tourniquets, and dressing wounds. I’m also teaching them how to use basic woodworking tools (I’m teaching my husband as well ☺️). When I started this homeschooling journey I looked to fill the many holes I had in my public school education. I feel the practical education is getting much worse! What a shame. This is a good list..oh, and a can opener. You’d be surprised how many kids don’t know how to use one.
I appreciate the wisdom of the first paragraph, it's how we live ourselves, but I was intending to keep this guide curated for things EVERYONE should know, including people who live in apartments in cities or in suburbs.
Sadly, a majority of Americans are not in a position to grow any substantial amounts of their own food, and probably can't change that circumstance.
You can grow herbs in pots and small veggies in 5 gal. buckets. You might not be able to totally feed yourself, but you can make what you have tasty and have a side salad, if nothing else.
Believe me, coming from Chicago,I get it. I’m always shocked when people are absolutely clueless on how to grow a tomato or simple herbs. That should be common knowledge.
Or that different nations have different kinds of cans and you therefore need a very basic can-opener. The number of americans, brits and aussies I've seen struggling to open a canof fermented herring, not realising that a) that's an old-school hardmetal can and b) thy are using the wrong kind of opener is in triple digits by now.
On the other hand, the reactions when the can sprays the juices of fishes fermented in their own dissolved spines, lactic acids, and salty brine are priceless.
Do a Youtube search for "surströmming challenge US" and you'll find clips from the present and all the way back to 2010 of people having ordered surströmming (fermented baltic sea herring).
The challenge is to open the can without retching, dry-heaving or throwing up and then eating a fish.
Fewer than one in a hundred can manage that, hardly surprising since the gas released is a mix of propionic, butyric and acetic acid as well as hydrogen sulfide.
And even fewer than that can get a bite down.
Be aware though, that there's lots of retching and vomiting and screaming on the clips, and foul language.
Eaten on chewy flatbread (wheat/potato flour mix baked in an old school stone oven is my go-to) with cold boiled potatoes, chopped red onions and fresh chives, gräddfil (swedish style sour cream) with milk to drink, and snapps (schnapps) between each klämma (lit. squeeze, because you roll it all up in bread and squeeze it to keep the bread from unravelling).
Though I'm more partial to "bitå", dialect name for a different kind of fish wrapped in bread -a small localfish called blikta is salted then smoked and eaten whole since it's about 2" long in a roll of flatbread as above. Bitå means "bite off".
Now, if I could only convince the germans downin the village that mört* is not fit for human consumtion...
*English name is "common roach", that should tell you all you need to know about that fish.
Excellent points and I like it all the more that this is written by a woman. My daughters 'learned' (i'm using that liberally, were exposed to is more accurate for 2 of the 3) how to slaughter and process chickens (my oldest is the queen eviscerator), rabbits, turkeys, help butcher pigs. When the older 2 discovered power tools, it was a eureka moment! And since the youngest is moving into her first non-student apt this week, I'm sure she'll come to the same appreciation.
Haha, had to laugh with the can-opener. And light a gas burner! (light the match first, then turn on the gas...) Lighting pilots is something I need to learn, it still scares me.
Solid list, comrade. The fact that many adults don't know most of these items is an indictment of our failing public education system. Homeschooling is the future - here is a curriculum that maps into your post: https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/how-to-homeschool-your-kids
While I agree (that last sentence in the article was there for a reason) that this is the primary job of parents, some legitimate shame is owed our educational institutions. I DID actually learn the majority of things on this list outside of the home, mostly in high school- home economics and shop classes (for both sexes), sex ed (which was about health and biology and not ideology), and social studies (which primarily taught civics and not ideology), and so on. And I'm only in my mid-40s.
That said, that world is clearly gone, and parents need to assume responsibility if they want their children to enter the adult world with any skills whatsoever.
I married an Eagle Scout. I can honestly say, he’s always prepared and has changed tires for women stranded on roadways. Keeps an emergency kit in the car and home. Knows and demonstrates gun safety. Can make home repairs. Young ladies, these men are rare indeed now. My dad had these skills and I was lucky enough to find a man that I knew could step up to the plate as needed.
Boy and Girl Scouts were amazing organizations for these things, as I can attest to myself. For those that are repelled by the political direction Scouts organizations have taken, there are other lesser-known orgs like Frontier Girls and Pioneer Scouts that (AFAIK) have not all been ideologically captured that offer more traditional curricula.
I will never pass up an opportunity to trash the Girl Scouts. What a thoroughly disappointing experience. I wanted to learn how to build fires, tie knots, prepare a campsite, track animals, identify rocks, and whittle... well, anything, really. Instead, our merit badges were in interior decorating (cut pictures out of a magazine and tape them inside a shoebox), party planning (design tasteful invitations, plan menus and entertainment), and fashion (idk, still haven't learned this). Defying all odds, we did have overnight camp one year, at a real actual camp. Would there be wilderness exploration?? Orienteering??? Encounters with unpleasant plants???? No, don't be ridiculous. The Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts camped on the same property. While the boys took canoes out around the pond, the girls weren't even allowed to wade in the shallows. Archery and stargazing? Certainly not, since they require either pointy objects or being outdoors in the dark. Thus began my misanthropy in earnest. /rant
I can confidently tell you that there were places and times in our country where the Girl Scouts did focus more on those "boy" skills and activities. I had a colleague some years ago in Canada where they are still called "Girl Guides," and the culture focused more on the traditional outdoorsmanship than the modern "Teen Cosmo" bullshit that GSA does in the states.
I've always suspected (but never confirmed) there were better and worse Scout/Guide groups, so I'm glad to hear your anecdote. I also hold out hope that the Girl Scouts organization has changed for the better since the benighted era I remember, but every year when I see those kids pleading robotically behind tables for folks to buy their lousy overpriced cookies (there, I said it. the cookies are crap), I have doubts.
It's been a long time but unfortunately I've heard it's pretty political these days.
Otoh, it's always mattered a lot where a local troop is. In our area here the Girl and Boy Scout troops seem to be more traditional in their activities as the community is more conservative.
They largely reflect the culture of the local parents even if the parent organizations have gone off the deep end.
Before I even finish reading, I must confess I am envious of your team of tapirs. All I have is one albino aardvark cousin. Here I thought I was fancy,my first armadillo being " of no color" .
I didn't even think I Had rats. Honest to goodness, as much as I know about "wildlife" I thought they were an urban issue...until my cat presented me with a carcass, minus the head. Wood rats are large. Dayum.
I have possums, but not the useful dammit...I been to shower and go to the gym. Uuuugh... bbiab
Once upon a time I worked as a temp in a place that ostensibly helped youth. In one of the staff meetings, I was asked to "contribute". I suspect that was an early example of "everyone gets a say, even the temp". I suggested the youth be taught manners, because that would help them get more help from adults within and outside of the organization. My suggestion was met with unanimous pity and mild derision. Silly me, these youth had much bigger problems than MANNERS. It was treated like a funny archaic naive idea. I wish I'd been sharp enough to be rude on the spot and make them realize how much they expected manners in their own lives. It took me a long time to understand the condescension in the system.
A fun book for children, if you can find it: The Muppet Guide to Magnificent Manners (c) 1984
Manners are a really, really big deal. I thought about going on a tangent about this under the heading on manners but it would have been long enough to distract focus from the list.
The sections on Manners and Communication are probably the most fundamental survival skills for a "modern young person" who is somehow able to avoid every one of the other practical realities of the other lists (I am aware that there are people who manage to live in such a way). Absolutely NO ONE, even if you claim your politics or ideology or personal ethics don't do this, is immune to the completely natural evaluation of a person's competence, value, and status based on their social skills.
It remains true- supported by research you can look up yourself- that no matter what has changed in technology or social norms, that people who lack the skills under those two headings will have fewer friends, get fewer jobs, advance less in those jobs, and have a harder time finding romantic partners.
Which is what infuriates me when I see wokies try very hard to convince everyone that demanding kids absorb these skills is "enacting whiteness" or "reinforcing white supremacy." You are setting your kids up to fail if you teach them to disdain being able to communicate clearly, present yourself as educated, and demonstrate self-control in your speech.
Manners and communication is more or less what we taught autistic youths/adults, until "normal" became synonymous with "nazi".
So now, such kids are taught to be themselves instead and to not let anyone impose any norms or values on them.
Meaning they often learn their social skills from online gaming, Reddit, Instagram and 4Chan (or whatever is the new cool that 4Chan was). Cartman is a model youth in comparison.
Unemployment among the mentally handicapped in Sweden is above 90%. That tiny percentage that does find real work is the rare few Aspies that have the aptitude and ability to get into tech-jobs. The rest are either on permanent welfare/disability or are offered early retirement, often as soon as the become legal adults.
This is regarded as much better than the old "be all you can be"-approach.
I had a great-uncle who was fairly high functioning, but pretty far below average intelligence.
My uncle lived in northern Michigan, and spent his decades-long career being useful as a caretaker and excavator for the local cemetery. He was very happy, and an extraordinarily kind person.
There's no reason able-bodied people of less than average intelligence shouldn't make themselves useful. Of course, he was raised in an era and culture where it was just assumed that people did what they could.
Those kinds of jobs were precisely the ones often reserved for the handicapped here, only two decades ago, if it was a city council or municipality job.
Janitorial services, cleaning and sweeping, clearing brush and undergrowth, graveyard caretaker, and so on. Simple (as in not complex), manual, repetitive, and with a need for meticulousness - all areas that autistics no matter their cognitive levels can excel at if given the opportunity and mentorship.
No more. Those jobs have virtually disappeared. Now, normal groundskeepers (called "green area caretakers" in newspeak) and janitors do everything for the local county or eq. Teachers also work as servers in the school lunch room and cafeteria. Nursing staff has to perform janitorial and custodian services while also taking care of people.
Neoliberal economic policies, there's nothing it can ruin even more than socialism.
However, I'm positive that all countries with people of different colors have their own version of manners. They may not be exactly like ours, but respect for others/elders is probably high on all lists.
I can just imagine. I've created a system for youth at risk and got accolades for my finished product but as I live in Australia with the government running everything, no one could let me work with them as I was not a psychologist (an IT professional background). I am a certified youth worker but that is not enough. I sit here with such great skills with no one who can allow me to help. All these comments made me cry over the fact that I am an American who speaks out but am shoved down as Australians are not supposed to stand up and speak out. This article is incredible and all types of youth would love to learn these principles but there is no way to organise such a course in this country, not for me anyway. I watch all that is going on in the US today and just sit here, retired, with no one for whom I can help as all are so scared and do not trust those outside of their tight circle, and are mostly extremely uninformed. I'm being heavy here, I know., sorry. I should add that I am 70 and so glad for all I have been through and all that I have become but am saddened by the lack of appreciation for an elder who has valuable skills. I'll use my time to continue to grow by becoming very well informed around TRUE/REAL current events around the world.
Excellent list! I was talking with Grant Smith about this sort of thing, kind of a "This is what basic human propriety demands, and how to do that" project. Maybe we should talk a bit about that together.
There are a lot of reasons why A) a default skillset existed for most of human history and it was a given that non-feral humans would learn it and B) that doesn't happen anymore. I'm starting to find myself shifting mentally and emotionally away from endlessly bitching about the WHY and more about the HOW.
An important remedy that IS timeless is the rebuilding of societal expectations: it is right and reasonable that we assume baseline skills from adults and not be tolerant of those deficits. Some of that means shaming sometimes, but some of that also means not ignoring its absence.
Exactly. I would like to have a basic primer to hand my girls of things they need to do, with basic instructions or at least pointers to find out how to do them. Both for reference, and for the "look, it was in the book, you should know this" aspect. "We didn't get taught that in school" is too common an excuse; you can find damned near anything on Youtube, but you need to know what to look for and you need to know that you should look for it.
If I could devote a couple years of my life to focus entirely on this, I would probably write and publish such a book that parents could give to their kids or families could keep on the bookshelf/glove compartment.
Even if I knew how to do your entire list(s), I'd read that book. Different people have different perspectives on how to do things. I'd be happy to learn an easier way to do something.
About 5 years ago I had a flat tire at my apartment complex. I knew we were all in trouble when ( I didn’t have the strength to loosen the lug nut) & a 20 something guy told me he could call triple A for me.
For the lug nut problem, always keep a universal lubricant like WD-40 in your vehicle. If you find you're not strong enough to loosen it, the vast majority of the time it's frozen; you shouldn't have to be He-Man to loosen a lug nut unless a previous mechanic used a pneumatic wrench and went insanely overboard.
A decent trick for that if you don't have any penetrating oil handy is to keep about 2-3 feet of steel pipe that just fits over the handle end of your wrench (assuming it isn't a big cross wrench but one of the little single socked tire irons cars often come with. Put the wrench on the lug nut so that the handle sticks out at ~10 o'clock, put the pipe on the other end, and now you have a 2-3' lever to apply. You can even stand on it if needed, and any nut that won't bust loose with 100-200 lbs bouncing at the end of a 3' lever isn't coming loose, ever.
Yea, finding out you can put a bit of pipe on normal tools to make MEGA LEVERS was a game changer for me, right up there with finding out there were other things than abrasive cut off wheels I could mount on my angle grinder. It makes all sorts of normal stuff vastly more powerful, and dangerous, at very little cost.
Amen. One of the best things I learned from my dad was "Having the right tool for the job is best, but knowing how to use the wrong tool to get the job done is a close second, because there are a lot of wrong tools for any job." (My formulation, not his.)
His other favorite saying, "Everything fits if you push hard enough" was a little less useful, and was why my mother tasked me to supervise his home improvement efforts from about the age of 6. Ol' Pap sometimes lets his enthusiasm get away from him :D
as a mechanic i can say that different wheels have different torques, my work van is 140nm and the supplied wrench is only tiny. its pretty damn tough for me and im a big bloke, i tend to end up standing on the wrench
Thanks. Exactly!( & at the time I was being gangstalked and the mechanic was part of my problem. Long story but I had reported a registered sex offender for grooming children and I had many headaches from doing the right thing. God me closer to God though, so it was ok in the end . )I was in upstate New York and now I’m happily in central Florida.
I had a record number of flat tires there. Thankful to be outta that government subsidized apartment complex. W d 40 is a very helpful tool ! And old fashioned cat litter for being stuck in the snow.
Delivering a baby is several orders of magnitude easier than saving a life using CPR and an AED. How do I know? Other than my own children's births, which were in hospital, I have participated in the birth of 1 other child in an out of hospital setting. The amount of actual work on my part was minimal, mom did the hard part and out popped a baby. After literally 30 seconds of work on my part, suctioning the mouth and nose and clamping the cord, I handed the baby back to mom and it took less than a minute for junior to latch onto a breast and have his first meal. High stress sure, but no sweat. I have a 100% batting average. One delivery, 1 healthy baby and mother.
On the other hand, I have participated in CPR and AED use well over 100 times outside of the hospital from the age of 12 days to 97 years, and several times in hospital. It is hard work, it is brutal both to the person who is leaving this mortal plane as well as those trying to prevent it from happening. Broken ribs are a common side effect to the patient and is a sign that the CPR is being done strenuously enough to be effective. It is hard work breaking ribs with your own 2 hands and body weight. Popping and crunching noises aside it is a serious cardio workout for the person doing the CPR. Alas, all that effort and I still have a 0.000% batting average. That is right, I never had a save, they all died. And they just didn't die, they never regained spontaneous circulation. They may have been alive when I met them, most were not, but they all ended up dead permanently in spite of all my efforts. Saving lives is hard, it is a whole lot easier to lose them than get them back.
As for the rest of the list I can check them off without exception.
But one I would like to see you add because it seems to be seriously lacking today.
Know how to work.
Work hard.
Work so hard that when you go home at the end of the day you are tired and sore.
Dig a grave by hand because all of us are going to croak one day and we should all have at least put in the effort to create our own eternal resting place. Seems a lot of people can't even say they have done that today.
Kill your own dinner at least once in your life.
Extra Credit given for raising that dinner from birth to death and processing it yourself.
Thank you for sharing two things in particular in your comment that I think not enough people know: that CPR is brutal, physically exhausting, and usually fails; and second the account of delivering a live birth outside of the hospital. One of the big hobby horses I very rarely climb onto on Substack is the medicalization of human pregnancy and the home birth movement. My MIL was a nurse midwife, several of my high school buddies grew up to be midwives or doulas. Babies are normal and birth is normally safe and simultaneously mundane and extraordinary.
I think the reason people don't understand the reality of both situations is because of TV and movies. They get both things exactly opposite for "dramatic effect". On TV CPR almost always works, in reality it almost never works, particularly if you arrive after a 911 call as I did. And childbirth is the opposite. On TV they always make it a "life threatening situation" again for dramatic effect. Don't get me wrong, even an "uneventful" delivery sucks for everyone involved, particularly for first time mothers and fathers especially. But the reality is most deliveries don't involve a lot of medical stuff going on and after the first one can happen quick and unexpectedly. More than once I went to a call for "female 40 weeks pregnant, water broke in active labor" and showed up less than 10 minutes later to find mom nursing a little bundle of joy. Invariably they say, "That was different than my first child where I was in labor for 16 hours. My water broke, I called 911 went to get a bag packed and it just popped out." Toilet deliveries happen because women feel like they need to have a bowel movement or because they want to have one before they go to the hospital and just a little push can be all it takes.
What always surprises me is just how tough newborns are. Little linebackers when they first come into the world. A lot tougher than anyone thinks. It is almost like they have evolved in a world where they were frequently dropped on their head from the birth canal.
Had to look up "twilight birth". It did not refer those horrid books about sparkly suckers, but something worse.
Injecting the woman with scopolamine and morphine when she's about to drop her litter? Hur ini alla Helvetets brunsmorda blådjävlars arslen would anyone think that is a good idea?
I am so glad our midwives here are such hardcases - pain relief only if it is medically warranted. Same goes for cutting the baby out. And women wanting to give birth at home are covered under public health insurance if they apply in good time. Some clinics/hospitals even offer giving birth in water (non-chlorinated and sterile!).
Hey now, if I manage to add value, it's because of the quality of our hostess (and thank you).
Ahem, the curse is old-fashioned. Kids these days just go "Fuck this" or such, due to Hollywood and US TV/internet/music-shows teaching them that's how you speak american english, every third word is "Fuck".
Me, I like creative cursing. A literal (I wonder how many times I've mixed up literal and litoral?) translation:
"How in all of Hell's brownsmeard blue-devils' arseholes". I.e. "how is it possible" plus the outrage of such a swear.
Older curses often refers to Hell, the Devil or a combination plus arseholes and feces. Grand-dads favourite was "Hell-cursed hexed and cursed damned shits of the Devil!".
Often, older swears sound like sayings or proverbs rather than just a single curse-word. "Kors i arschlet sa kärringen, satte sig på lien" f.e.
"Cross my ass said the bitch, sat on the scythe". Used as an expression of surprise over a coincidence.
Good list, Guttermouth. The way you started out, I thought you were going to pull a "Scott Adams " and advise that we remove ourselves from any assemblage of Gen Zs...
To your list, I would add basic knowledge of world history. I am constantly amazed at how ignorant people--even highly educated people--are of history. Studying the past gives us insights into how/why nations act in the present age. This ignorance is being manipulated now by bad actors intent on destroying the West. Why defend racist, sexist, homophobic colonizers? WE(F) can do better!!!
I really wanted to try to confine myself to the ABSOLUTE bare minimum that should be expected of an adult. I wouldn't let any child of mine grow up without learning world history, but at a minimum, knowing American history (which was on the list) will at least allow you to put yourself in context.
I'm in my 50s, CERT trained, and have no experience or knowledge with drug overdoses and Narcan. I'd think responding to a diabetic issue is more likely.
It depends where you live. In many parts of the US, you're more likely as a random stranger to deal with an overdose.
Most states and major cities offer very short (2 hour or so) courses that give you an emergency Narcan kit you can keep in your purse or pocket at the end. Some areas are starting to sell them in drug stores.
Meanwhile, here in Hawaii, they are still deciding whether Narcan is even legal for the police and EMTs, let alone we mere peons. I love knowing that emergency kits such as you described are available to the public in other areas (after a short course, of course).
That infuriates me. It's virtually impossible to harm someone with Narcan/Narcalone. The dosers are basically Nasonex inhalers so it's not like you could even injure someone with them.
This is one of the all-time best, most useful substack articles I've ever read. Thank you, Gutter!
I have to say, though, my bucket list just expanded -- both personally and as a (grand)parental unit.
Oh, and one small addition I'd like to propose (if nobody else has done so already) is Know how to safely shut off your natural gas and / or propane supply, as applicable.
Hearing these kinds of comments makes my day. I hope at least some of the folks you share it with get something out of it, or at least get some food for thought!
Once again, I have read your post nodding my head with you all the way thru! I'll be forwarding this one to both my sons who are raising girls. I had lunch with a friend over the weekend and we talked about how we raised (my case)/are raising (hers) our children in the same way we grew up - no cell phones, no/limited video game time, GO OUTSIDE AND PLAY, etc - and how they will be much more rounded people for it. Now to read the comments for anything missing from your very comprehensive list.
There are some good comments, for sure. Understand that I'm not taking absolutely every single suggestion because I'm trying to stay focused on presenting what I feel is a MINIMUM of what everyone, regardless of their very specific circumstance, should one to function.
If I made a list of what we would LIKE every single person around us to know and be able to do and for to act we'd be here for a century.
You are giving your girls the most wonderful gift of all! I just wrote about the devastating impact that social media is having on kids brains (Tik tok - Time is running out for saving our children's brains). Unsupervised free play is one of the inoculations against depression and anxiety that the majority of girls now face.
I would add knowing how to grow food, or basic botany. I’m homeschooling my 11&8 yo boys and we have a similar list. My goal was that by they are 12, they know how to grow basic vegetables, raise a chick/turkey to maturity, slaughter it, and cook an entire meal (including side dishes) using that bird. My 11yo is nearly there (still needs help slaughtering), but they helped me cull our rabbits and I feel pretty confident they know how to do all of the above with it.
I’m a retired RN who left Chicago almost 6 yrs ago and I’ve learned all of these things myself, so they are benefiting watching me learn from mistakes. I’m also taking a deep dive into anatomy (it helps when we cull various animals) and will be teaching them the basics of starting an IV, using tourniquets, and dressing wounds. I’m also teaching them how to use basic woodworking tools (I’m teaching my husband as well ☺️). When I started this homeschooling journey I looked to fill the many holes I had in my public school education. I feel the practical education is getting much worse! What a shame. This is a good list..oh, and a can opener. You’d be surprised how many kids don’t know how to use one.
I appreciate the wisdom of the first paragraph, it's how we live ourselves, but I was intending to keep this guide curated for things EVERYONE should know, including people who live in apartments in cities or in suburbs.
Sadly, a majority of Americans are not in a position to grow any substantial amounts of their own food, and probably can't change that circumstance.
You can grow herbs in pots and small veggies in 5 gal. buckets. You might not be able to totally feed yourself, but you can make what you have tasty and have a side salad, if nothing else.
Let's not forget the wonders of sprouting in the kitchen, a nice skill to have in northern climes.
Or wherever there's a window, so they'll get sun.
Believe me, coming from Chicago,I get it. I’m always shocked when people are absolutely clueless on how to grow a tomato or simple herbs. That should be common knowledge.
Or know what a can opener IS.
Or that different nations have different kinds of cans and you therefore need a very basic can-opener. The number of americans, brits and aussies I've seen struggling to open a canof fermented herring, not realising that a) that's an old-school hardmetal can and b) thy are using the wrong kind of opener is in triple digits by now.
On the other hand, the reactions when the can sprays the juices of fishes fermented in their own dissolved spines, lactic acids, and salty brine are priceless.
😂😂😂😂😂😂. I love you💞😘
Grossssss!
Do a Youtube search for "surströmming challenge US" and you'll find clips from the present and all the way back to 2010 of people having ordered surströmming (fermented baltic sea herring).
The challenge is to open the can without retching, dry-heaving or throwing up and then eating a fish.
Fewer than one in a hundred can manage that, hardly surprising since the gas released is a mix of propionic, butyric and acetic acid as well as hydrogen sulfide.
And even fewer than that can get a bite down.
Be aware though, that there's lots of retching and vomiting and screaming on the clips, and foul language.
I have tried a small bite because I love trying food.
Once in my mouth, the taste and texture was fine- I like nearly any sort of fish.
But the smell beforehand was sickening.
Yeah, the taste is nothing like the smell really.
Eaten on chewy flatbread (wheat/potato flour mix baked in an old school stone oven is my go-to) with cold boiled potatoes, chopped red onions and fresh chives, gräddfil (swedish style sour cream) with milk to drink, and snapps (schnapps) between each klämma (lit. squeeze, because you roll it all up in bread and squeeze it to keep the bread from unravelling).
Though I'm more partial to "bitå", dialect name for a different kind of fish wrapped in bread -a small localfish called blikta is salted then smoked and eaten whole since it's about 2" long in a roll of flatbread as above. Bitå means "bite off".
Now, if I could only convince the germans downin the village that mört* is not fit for human consumtion...
*English name is "common roach", that should tell you all you need to know about that fish.
Hard pass! I can go my life without this or balut.
GM is lucky she likes fish. I grew up on the ocean,and I can hardly stand it. Mahi or other very very light fish are ok once a decade 🤔
I can't imagine wanting fermented fish. ....but there are very few types of fish I like.
This! ...fermented veggies ? Yum! Fermented meat? Gross!
My 20 yr old niece asked me to microwave food for her😣
🤦
This past week I told my 9 year old "Remind me this weekend, I want to show you how to use the microwave." Her response:
"Uhm... Daddy, maybe we should wait until I am 10 years old, because I am not sure I am responsible enough to use the microwave yet."
Me: "When you say things like that, it makes me think I waited too long."
She learned to use the microwave. I think she will be fine.
D'awww
I am so sorry!
Lazyness or does she really not know how to use one?
Both
She is a master manipulator. I did not take the bait😂
Good job!
Ffs
Excellent points and I like it all the more that this is written by a woman. My daughters 'learned' (i'm using that liberally, were exposed to is more accurate for 2 of the 3) how to slaughter and process chickens (my oldest is the queen eviscerator), rabbits, turkeys, help butcher pigs. When the older 2 discovered power tools, it was a eureka moment! And since the youngest is moving into her first non-student apt this week, I'm sure she'll come to the same appreciation.
Haha, had to laugh with the can-opener. And light a gas burner! (light the match first, then turn on the gas...) Lighting pilots is something I need to learn, it still scares me.
Solid list, comrade. The fact that many adults don't know most of these items is an indictment of our failing public education system. Homeschooling is the future - here is a curriculum that maps into your post: https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/how-to-homeschool-your-kids
While I agree (that last sentence in the article was there for a reason) that this is the primary job of parents, some legitimate shame is owed our educational institutions. I DID actually learn the majority of things on this list outside of the home, mostly in high school- home economics and shop classes (for both sexes), sex ed (which was about health and biology and not ideology), and social studies (which primarily taught civics and not ideology), and so on. And I'm only in my mid-40s.
That said, that world is clearly gone, and parents need to assume responsibility if they want their children to enter the adult world with any skills whatsoever.
What about nutrition? Understanding the basics.
Bonus points for knowing that the Food Pyramid is one of the most grotesque forms of propaganda ever foisted upon a generation.
I will add a point on nutrition.
Added under "Your Body, Your Problem."
Oh! Lordy, yes! Especially the newest pyramid. Eat sugary cereal the most. Rarely eat vegetables and meat.
It all tells you what kind of people the goverment wants. Fat, sick, and dependent on them.
I married an Eagle Scout. I can honestly say, he’s always prepared and has changed tires for women stranded on roadways. Keeps an emergency kit in the car and home. Knows and demonstrates gun safety. Can make home repairs. Young ladies, these men are rare indeed now. My dad had these skills and I was lucky enough to find a man that I knew could step up to the plate as needed.
Boy and Girl Scouts were amazing organizations for these things, as I can attest to myself. For those that are repelled by the political direction Scouts organizations have taken, there are other lesser-known orgs like Frontier Girls and Pioneer Scouts that (AFAIK) have not all been ideologically captured that offer more traditional curricula.
I will never pass up an opportunity to trash the Girl Scouts. What a thoroughly disappointing experience. I wanted to learn how to build fires, tie knots, prepare a campsite, track animals, identify rocks, and whittle... well, anything, really. Instead, our merit badges were in interior decorating (cut pictures out of a magazine and tape them inside a shoebox), party planning (design tasteful invitations, plan menus and entertainment), and fashion (idk, still haven't learned this). Defying all odds, we did have overnight camp one year, at a real actual camp. Would there be wilderness exploration?? Orienteering??? Encounters with unpleasant plants???? No, don't be ridiculous. The Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts camped on the same property. While the boys took canoes out around the pond, the girls weren't even allowed to wade in the shallows. Archery and stargazing? Certainly not, since they require either pointy objects or being outdoors in the dark. Thus began my misanthropy in earnest. /rant
I can confidently tell you that there were places and times in our country where the Girl Scouts did focus more on those "boy" skills and activities. I had a colleague some years ago in Canada where they are still called "Girl Guides," and the culture focused more on the traditional outdoorsmanship than the modern "Teen Cosmo" bullshit that GSA does in the states.
I've always suspected (but never confirmed) there were better and worse Scout/Guide groups, so I'm glad to hear your anecdote. I also hold out hope that the Girl Scouts organization has changed for the better since the benighted era I remember, but every year when I see those kids pleading robotically behind tables for folks to buy their lousy overpriced cookies (there, I said it. the cookies are crap), I have doubts.
It's been a long time but unfortunately I've heard it's pretty political these days.
Otoh, it's always mattered a lot where a local troop is. In our area here the Girl and Boy Scout troops seem to be more traditional in their activities as the community is more conservative.
They largely reflect the culture of the local parents even if the parent organizations have gone off the deep end.
Our parents are where we find them.
Well, you had the sense to go looking instead of sheltering in place waiting for them to show up. That deserves some credit.
Before I even finish reading, I must confess I am envious of your team of tapirs. All I have is one albino aardvark cousin. Here I thought I was fancy,my first armadillo being " of no color" .
Pretty much everything I do would be impossible without a huge studio team of tapirs, possums, and rats.
I didn't even think I Had rats. Honest to goodness, as much as I know about "wildlife" I thought they were an urban issue...until my cat presented me with a carcass, minus the head. Wood rats are large. Dayum.
I have possums, but not the useful dammit...I been to shower and go to the gym. Uuuugh... bbiab
Once upon a time I worked as a temp in a place that ostensibly helped youth. In one of the staff meetings, I was asked to "contribute". I suspect that was an early example of "everyone gets a say, even the temp". I suggested the youth be taught manners, because that would help them get more help from adults within and outside of the organization. My suggestion was met with unanimous pity and mild derision. Silly me, these youth had much bigger problems than MANNERS. It was treated like a funny archaic naive idea. I wish I'd been sharp enough to be rude on the spot and make them realize how much they expected manners in their own lives. It took me a long time to understand the condescension in the system.
A fun book for children, if you can find it: The Muppet Guide to Magnificent Manners (c) 1984
Manners are a really, really big deal. I thought about going on a tangent about this under the heading on manners but it would have been long enough to distract focus from the list.
The sections on Manners and Communication are probably the most fundamental survival skills for a "modern young person" who is somehow able to avoid every one of the other practical realities of the other lists (I am aware that there are people who manage to live in such a way). Absolutely NO ONE, even if you claim your politics or ideology or personal ethics don't do this, is immune to the completely natural evaluation of a person's competence, value, and status based on their social skills.
It remains true- supported by research you can look up yourself- that no matter what has changed in technology or social norms, that people who lack the skills under those two headings will have fewer friends, get fewer jobs, advance less in those jobs, and have a harder time finding romantic partners.
Which is what infuriates me when I see wokies try very hard to convince everyone that demanding kids absorb these skills is "enacting whiteness" or "reinforcing white supremacy." You are setting your kids up to fail if you teach them to disdain being able to communicate clearly, present yourself as educated, and demonstrate self-control in your speech.
Manners and communication is more or less what we taught autistic youths/adults, until "normal" became synonymous with "nazi".
So now, such kids are taught to be themselves instead and to not let anyone impose any norms or values on them.
Meaning they often learn their social skills from online gaming, Reddit, Instagram and 4Chan (or whatever is the new cool that 4Chan was). Cartman is a model youth in comparison.
Unemployment among the mentally handicapped in Sweden is above 90%. That tiny percentage that does find real work is the rare few Aspies that have the aptitude and ability to get into tech-jobs. The rest are either on permanent welfare/disability or are offered early retirement, often as soon as the become legal adults.
This is regarded as much better than the old "be all you can be"-approach.
That is tragic.
I had a great-uncle who was fairly high functioning, but pretty far below average intelligence.
My uncle lived in northern Michigan, and spent his decades-long career being useful as a caretaker and excavator for the local cemetery. He was very happy, and an extraordinarily kind person.
There's no reason able-bodied people of less than average intelligence shouldn't make themselves useful. Of course, he was raised in an era and culture where it was just assumed that people did what they could.
Those kinds of jobs were precisely the ones often reserved for the handicapped here, only two decades ago, if it was a city council or municipality job.
Janitorial services, cleaning and sweeping, clearing brush and undergrowth, graveyard caretaker, and so on. Simple (as in not complex), manual, repetitive, and with a need for meticulousness - all areas that autistics no matter their cognitive levels can excel at if given the opportunity and mentorship.
No more. Those jobs have virtually disappeared. Now, normal groundskeepers (called "green area caretakers" in newspeak) and janitors do everything for the local county or eq. Teachers also work as servers in the school lunch room and cafeteria. Nursing staff has to perform janitorial and custodian services while also taking care of people.
Neoliberal economic policies, there's nothing it can ruin even more than socialism.
It's much the same here, in terms of no real place in useful life for people with limited cognitive abilities.
It's such a travesty to push people away from being functional and into being burdensome.
However, I'm positive that all countries with people of different colors have their own version of manners. They may not be exactly like ours, but respect for others/elders is probably high on all lists.
Except in America.
I can just imagine. I've created a system for youth at risk and got accolades for my finished product but as I live in Australia with the government running everything, no one could let me work with them as I was not a psychologist (an IT professional background). I am a certified youth worker but that is not enough. I sit here with such great skills with no one who can allow me to help. All these comments made me cry over the fact that I am an American who speaks out but am shoved down as Australians are not supposed to stand up and speak out. This article is incredible and all types of youth would love to learn these principles but there is no way to organise such a course in this country, not for me anyway. I watch all that is going on in the US today and just sit here, retired, with no one for whom I can help as all are so scared and do not trust those outside of their tight circle, and are mostly extremely uninformed. I'm being heavy here, I know., sorry. I should add that I am 70 and so glad for all I have been through and all that I have become but am saddened by the lack of appreciation for an elder who has valuable skills. I'll use my time to continue to grow by becoming very well informed around TRUE/REAL current events around the world.
Excellent list! I was talking with Grant Smith about this sort of thing, kind of a "This is what basic human propriety demands, and how to do that" project. Maybe we should talk a bit about that together.
Good deal!
There are a lot of reasons why A) a default skillset existed for most of human history and it was a given that non-feral humans would learn it and B) that doesn't happen anymore. I'm starting to find myself shifting mentally and emotionally away from endlessly bitching about the WHY and more about the HOW.
An important remedy that IS timeless is the rebuilding of societal expectations: it is right and reasonable that we assume baseline skills from adults and not be tolerant of those deficits. Some of that means shaming sometimes, but some of that also means not ignoring its absence.
Exactly. I would like to have a basic primer to hand my girls of things they need to do, with basic instructions or at least pointers to find out how to do them. Both for reference, and for the "look, it was in the book, you should know this" aspect. "We didn't get taught that in school" is too common an excuse; you can find damned near anything on Youtube, but you need to know what to look for and you need to know that you should look for it.
If I could devote a couple years of my life to focus entirely on this, I would probably write and publish such a book that parents could give to their kids or families could keep on the bookshelf/glove compartment.
Let's talk.
Even if I knew how to do your entire list(s), I'd read that book. Different people have different perspectives on how to do things. I'd be happy to learn an easier way to do something.
About 5 years ago I had a flat tire at my apartment complex. I knew we were all in trouble when ( I didn’t have the strength to loosen the lug nut) & a 20 something guy told me he could call triple A for me.
Yeah, this is exactly what I'm talking about.
For the lug nut problem, always keep a universal lubricant like WD-40 in your vehicle. If you find you're not strong enough to loosen it, the vast majority of the time it's frozen; you shouldn't have to be He-Man to loosen a lug nut unless a previous mechanic used a pneumatic wrench and went insanely overboard.
A decent trick for that if you don't have any penetrating oil handy is to keep about 2-3 feet of steel pipe that just fits over the handle end of your wrench (assuming it isn't a big cross wrench but one of the little single socked tire irons cars often come with. Put the wrench on the lug nut so that the handle sticks out at ~10 o'clock, put the pipe on the other end, and now you have a 2-3' lever to apply. You can even stand on it if needed, and any nut that won't bust loose with 100-200 lbs bouncing at the end of a 3' lever isn't coming loose, ever.
I have frequently jumped up and down on my long-handled spanner to accomplish this and can confirm.
Yea, finding out you can put a bit of pipe on normal tools to make MEGA LEVERS was a game changer for me, right up there with finding out there were other things than abrasive cut off wheels I could mount on my angle grinder. It makes all sorts of normal stuff vastly more powerful, and dangerous, at very little cost.
We had a maple and a poplar land on the trampoline after last weekend's ice storm. I removed all the timber and left the fam to dismantle the tramp.
I watched the girls struggle to remove the anchors (U-shaped rebar) for about 15 minutes before bringing over the 2" pipe bender with a 4' handle.
So easy a pre-teen made short work of them.
MacGyver-ing may be the most valuable skill of all.
Amen. One of the best things I learned from my dad was "Having the right tool for the job is best, but knowing how to use the wrong tool to get the job done is a close second, because there are a lot of wrong tools for any job." (My formulation, not his.)
His other favorite saying, "Everything fits if you push hard enough" was a little less useful, and was why my mother tasked me to supervise his home improvement efforts from about the age of 6. Ol' Pap sometimes lets his enthusiasm get away from him :D
🙌 Amen!
as a mechanic i can say that different wheels have different torques, my work van is 140nm and the supplied wrench is only tiny. its pretty damn tough for me and im a big bloke, i tend to end up standing on the wrench
Thanks. Exactly!( & at the time I was being gangstalked and the mechanic was part of my problem. Long story but I had reported a registered sex offender for grooming children and I had many headaches from doing the right thing. God me closer to God though, so it was ok in the end . )I was in upstate New York and now I’m happily in central Florida.
That's a scary situation to be in, especially with a stranded vehicle.
I had a record number of flat tires there. Thankful to be outta that government subsidized apartment complex. W d 40 is a very helpful tool ! And old fashioned cat litter for being stuck in the snow.
Yep. Could you please write a letter to my spouse telling them that? There's no believing my lyin' ass, you know. 🙄😬🤬
They ALL go insanely overboard. I tell them, "Hand tight," and stand and watch that that's how they do it.
Yep. Even if he knew how, he probably wouldn't want to get his hands dirty.
Delivering a baby is several orders of magnitude easier than saving a life using CPR and an AED. How do I know? Other than my own children's births, which were in hospital, I have participated in the birth of 1 other child in an out of hospital setting. The amount of actual work on my part was minimal, mom did the hard part and out popped a baby. After literally 30 seconds of work on my part, suctioning the mouth and nose and clamping the cord, I handed the baby back to mom and it took less than a minute for junior to latch onto a breast and have his first meal. High stress sure, but no sweat. I have a 100% batting average. One delivery, 1 healthy baby and mother.
On the other hand, I have participated in CPR and AED use well over 100 times outside of the hospital from the age of 12 days to 97 years, and several times in hospital. It is hard work, it is brutal both to the person who is leaving this mortal plane as well as those trying to prevent it from happening. Broken ribs are a common side effect to the patient and is a sign that the CPR is being done strenuously enough to be effective. It is hard work breaking ribs with your own 2 hands and body weight. Popping and crunching noises aside it is a serious cardio workout for the person doing the CPR. Alas, all that effort and I still have a 0.000% batting average. That is right, I never had a save, they all died. And they just didn't die, they never regained spontaneous circulation. They may have been alive when I met them, most were not, but they all ended up dead permanently in spite of all my efforts. Saving lives is hard, it is a whole lot easier to lose them than get them back.
As for the rest of the list I can check them off without exception.
But one I would like to see you add because it seems to be seriously lacking today.
Know how to work.
Work hard.
Work so hard that when you go home at the end of the day you are tired and sore.
Dig a grave by hand because all of us are going to croak one day and we should all have at least put in the effort to create our own eternal resting place. Seems a lot of people can't even say they have done that today.
Kill your own dinner at least once in your life.
Extra Credit given for raising that dinner from birth to death and processing it yourself.
Thank you for sharing two things in particular in your comment that I think not enough people know: that CPR is brutal, physically exhausting, and usually fails; and second the account of delivering a live birth outside of the hospital. One of the big hobby horses I very rarely climb onto on Substack is the medicalization of human pregnancy and the home birth movement. My MIL was a nurse midwife, several of my high school buddies grew up to be midwives or doulas. Babies are normal and birth is normally safe and simultaneously mundane and extraordinary.
Thanks for sharing your experiences.
I think the reason people don't understand the reality of both situations is because of TV and movies. They get both things exactly opposite for "dramatic effect". On TV CPR almost always works, in reality it almost never works, particularly if you arrive after a 911 call as I did. And childbirth is the opposite. On TV they always make it a "life threatening situation" again for dramatic effect. Don't get me wrong, even an "uneventful" delivery sucks for everyone involved, particularly for first time mothers and fathers especially. But the reality is most deliveries don't involve a lot of medical stuff going on and after the first one can happen quick and unexpectedly. More than once I went to a call for "female 40 weeks pregnant, water broke in active labor" and showed up less than 10 minutes later to find mom nursing a little bundle of joy. Invariably they say, "That was different than my first child where I was in labor for 16 hours. My water broke, I called 911 went to get a bag packed and it just popped out." Toilet deliveries happen because women feel like they need to have a bowel movement or because they want to have one before they go to the hospital and just a little push can be all it takes.
What always surprises me is just how tough newborns are. Little linebackers when they first come into the world. A lot tougher than anyone thinks. It is almost like they have evolved in a world where they were frequently dropped on their head from the birth canal.
Had to look up "twilight birth". It did not refer those horrid books about sparkly suckers, but something worse.
Injecting the woman with scopolamine and morphine when she's about to drop her litter? Hur ini alla Helvetets brunsmorda blådjävlars arslen would anyone think that is a good idea?
I am so glad our midwives here are such hardcases - pain relief only if it is medically warranted. Same goes for cutting the baby out. And women wanting to give birth at home are covered under public health insurance if they apply in good time. Some clinics/hospitals even offer giving birth in water (non-chlorinated and sterile!).
Hey now, if I manage to add value, it's because of the quality of our hostess (and thank you).
Ahem, the curse is old-fashioned. Kids these days just go "Fuck this" or such, due to Hollywood and US TV/internet/music-shows teaching them that's how you speak american english, every third word is "Fuck".
Me, I like creative cursing. A literal (I wonder how many times I've mixed up literal and litoral?) translation:
"How in all of Hell's brownsmeard blue-devils' arseholes". I.e. "how is it possible" plus the outrage of such a swear.
Older curses often refers to Hell, the Devil or a combination plus arseholes and feces. Grand-dads favourite was "Hell-cursed hexed and cursed damned shits of the Devil!".
Often, older swears sound like sayings or proverbs rather than just a single curse-word. "Kors i arschlet sa kärringen, satte sig på lien" f.e.
"Cross my ass said the bitch, sat on the scythe". Used as an expression of surprise over a coincidence.
Much better than the ubiquitous "Fuck" I feel.
I would do it if it was a "you and a stranger in the middle of nowhere and no real option" situation.
Both my parents have had a DNR for some time. Mothermouth considered getting it on a bracelet at some point.
But think of the STORIES if you delivered babies., after you died, as a ghost!
Good list, Guttermouth. The way you started out, I thought you were going to pull a "Scott Adams " and advise that we remove ourselves from any assemblage of Gen Zs...
To your list, I would add basic knowledge of world history. I am constantly amazed at how ignorant people--even highly educated people--are of history. Studying the past gives us insights into how/why nations act in the present age. This ignorance is being manipulated now by bad actors intent on destroying the West. Why defend racist, sexist, homophobic colonizers? WE(F) can do better!!!
I agree and considered this.
I really wanted to try to confine myself to the ABSOLUTE bare minimum that should be expected of an adult. I wouldn't let any child of mine grow up without learning world history, but at a minimum, knowing American history (which was on the list) will at least allow you to put yourself in context.
I'm in my 50s, CERT trained, and have no experience or knowledge with drug overdoses and Narcan. I'd think responding to a diabetic issue is more likely.
It depends where you live. In many parts of the US, you're more likely as a random stranger to deal with an overdose.
Most states and major cities offer very short (2 hour or so) courses that give you an emergency Narcan kit you can keep in your purse or pocket at the end. Some areas are starting to sell them in drug stores.
https://www.narcan.com/
Meanwhile, here in Hawaii, they are still deciding whether Narcan is even legal for the police and EMTs, let alone we mere peons. I love knowing that emergency kits such as you described are available to the public in other areas (after a short course, of course).
That infuriates me. It's virtually impossible to harm someone with Narcan/Narcalone. The dosers are basically Nasonex inhalers so it's not like you could even injure someone with them.
They can save a life in literally seconds.
This is one of the all-time best, most useful substack articles I've ever read. Thank you, Gutter!
I have to say, though, my bucket list just expanded -- both personally and as a (grand)parental unit.
Oh, and one small addition I'd like to propose (if nobody else has done so already) is Know how to safely shut off your natural gas and / or propane supply, as applicable.
I'll add that to the electric and water basics under "Housekeeping" now. It's equally important.
Thanks! It could also qualify as emergency preparedness.
We live in tornado-land here, and I would never want to be crouching in a basement and hear that hissing sound, should my house be hit.
Excellent. I’m 76 yo. Sent this widely particularly 4 adult children with 10 grandchildren.
Hearing these kinds of comments makes my day. I hope at least some of the folks you share it with get something out of it, or at least get some food for thought!
Once again, I have read your post nodding my head with you all the way thru! I'll be forwarding this one to both my sons who are raising girls. I had lunch with a friend over the weekend and we talked about how we raised (my case)/are raising (hers) our children in the same way we grew up - no cell phones, no/limited video game time, GO OUTSIDE AND PLAY, etc - and how they will be much more rounded people for it. Now to read the comments for anything missing from your very comprehensive list.
There are some good comments, for sure. Understand that I'm not taking absolutely every single suggestion because I'm trying to stay focused on presenting what I feel is a MINIMUM of what everyone, regardless of their very specific circumstance, should one to function.
If I made a list of what we would LIKE every single person around us to know and be able to do and for to act we'd be here for a century.
But I'm really glad you like it so far.
You are giving your girls the most wonderful gift of all! I just wrote about the devastating impact that social media is having on kids brains (Tik tok - Time is running out for saving our children's brains). Unsupervised free play is one of the inoculations against depression and anxiety that the majority of girls now face.
Nice list.
One suggestion: have at least one favorite book not published in your lifetime.