I can't spell, but I can make kids laugh, what CAN'T you do if you can spell?

I cannot do math to save my life! You get numbers without zeros or fives at the end and I start to get a little wonky. My brain literally looks at them and says “nope! Not doing it!”

I cannot seem to effectively empathize with what some would call tragedy. That is, I don’t really feel much. My wife sent me a link to an article once about lack of empathy as it relates to the way I may have been raised, but I don’t see situations as necessarily good or bad. (at last not emotionally)

If I work at being more of a feeler, it feels pretty good. However, it still doesn’t come naturally and I miss many opportunities to connect on that level.

I sp ll ng th t im po r a nt?

@poofandmook, Yes. Math. Algebra in particular. I just don’t see the point. I don’t need algebra at the grocery store; at least spelling is useful!

You know, Bri, my grandmother always used to say “A logical mind can’t spell!” I see where she was going with that.

I sometimes have a hard time reading out loud. I mean to say one thing but it comes out as something entirely different. Most of the time it’s because I’m not focusing and I get the text mixed up with whatever I am thinking about. I tend to stumble over the words.

I can spell, but I cannot drive a stick shift. I have a hard time making fish come out well any way except fried. I’m in school to become a pastry chef and I struggle with shaping a baguette. (The long skinny French bread.) Geometry stumped me the minute we got to proofs.

@Bri – having taught school for several years, I can tell you that the ability to spell is not necessarily a sign of intelligence.

I’m just about the most clumsy person in the history of the Universe. Seriously.

(I also am very much so not a writer. I can babble, but usually forget key points and have to go back and add them later.)

I can spell, algebra is natural for me, and my sense of humor is pretty much my best quality (which is sad, I know), but I seem to have the memory of a goldfish. It is actually really bad.

The difference with not being able to spell and having a fear of heights is that you can’t look up fear of heights in a dictionary and get the solution. Poor spelling is not a mark of a lack of intelligence—not being able to look up the word is.

That said, I can spell but I have no patience.

@Sueanne: Oh me too. I’m perfectly convinced I’m going to have a heart attack or die of multiple ulcers by the age of 30 because I get sooooo angry at the stupidest things… like having to stop reading my book because the phone rings… AT WORK. No patience whatsoever. And my tolerance for stupidity? Even less.

I constantly remind myself that IF I wanted to learn how to do almost anything, I could…..That being said, I am not good at things mechanical. Ick.

Additionally, I also have to keep my opinoins, patience and temper in check at times when others don’t. In other words, frequently, people irritate me…..

I can spell pretty well, but my memory is really bad. I’m like a goldfish.

goldfish spell well???

I meant goldfish spell well???

(I am still learning how to use this text stuff….see—something ELSE I don’t do well)

Thanks all.

I had to try with algabra but could do geometry with no problem. Didn’t have to study at all. Odd. Somethings click and some things don’t.

Sometimes I think it is a matter of the right method or person helping. Sometimes the right motivation or timing

Math eludes me.

I suck at sports.

Dancing is out of the question.

well spelling isn’t my strong point I just keep a dictionary next to me at home and at work where spelling is very important and one other trick I use is to think of other words that mean the same but are easier to spell when I don’t feel like looking up words. Bri l, it looks like you are doing fine to me and people shouldn’t be too picky on spelling as long as you understand what the person is talking about.

Thanks hammer!

I think sometimes people can forget that in one venue it may call out a certain weakness in people but we all have them in other venues.

@Dave – Yup, me too on the dancing. The scary thing is that if I’ve had a couple of drink, I think I can dance -yikes! Not as bad as Elaine on “Seinfeld” but not good, either.

@Bri_L – you’re right, sometimes it is a matter of the teacher or method. Although I have to give poor Mr. O’Brien credit. He really did try to help me with those proofs. Sadly, I still only got a 63 on the final. :(

Brian; I can’t draw, carry a tune, pick up more than (Milo) 12 lbs, whistle thru my teeth for a taxi, play the banjo, cook intuitively, understand differential calculus or keep from spilling or knocking things off tables.

I can now hold a pencil under a braless boob, put a new battery in a hearing aid, eat kale, and empty a litter box.

Being a sharp-eyed and accurate editor is akin to having perfect pitch, I think. We all have our strengths and weaknesses, nu?

Come up with creative questions like this one!

Math and memory are my biggest downfalls. I diligently mark all birthdays in my calendar, only to forget to look at the calendar…good thing family and friends are very forgiving.

@Aug: Me, too. I practically have to wear my week’s schedule on a note around my neck.

@ loser – That was a really cool thing to say!

@gail: My cellphone has rescued me, lately. There is a calendar feature, complete with reminder alarms, that can be set to go off as much as 2 days ahead, and as little as 15 minutes ahead. It has become my lifeline.

I cannot do math, or cook. I once burned spaghettios.
It’s pretty sad.

@ genralspecific MAM! (get it. General Specific) Sorry. I can’t cook either. It once took me 3 hours to make a box cake.

I suck at sports, but I can cook
Math is a nightmare to me, but I’m a great listener
I have a really hard time expressing my feelings (my I love you sounds more like, I need ten bucks), but I can actually leave you breathless when I do something special for someone…
I drive manual, but I cannot understand my gf
sometimes, but please do not tell her

I burn everything, including myself, when I try to cook.
I suck at sports.
Don’t ask my opinion about anything decorative; I have no sense of design.

If it weren’t for Garanimals teaching me how, my clothes wouldn’t match.

at a club I can hold my liquor but can’t dance with my two left feet.

I have no common scense, things fly over my head a lot of the times, oh and Im clumsy. I have pretty good spelling, but horible grammar. I am a Ap English student too go figure.

@flameboi “my i love you sounds more like, I need ten bucks.” -> that’s awesome.

at tedibear39 (I had the idea for grrrManimals – to teach men how to dress. I’d still buy them if I thought I needed to dress in more than jeans and internet startup schwag.

@ideabrian – LOL! When husband #1 and I split up, he asked if I would garanimal his clothes because he was a bit color blind. I declined. :P

I can’t clip a cat’s nails either.

@tedibear Were you tempted to tell him “Sure!” and then do it wrong? :)

@tedibear – was it the clothes that caused the split? (for future reference only)

@Snoopy – Oh, very tempted, but I’m not usually a vindictive person

@ideabrian – LoL! No, but as I think about it, it could have been on the list….

I can’t figure out that question about the frizzer and the swimming pool.

@ poofandmook – what question is that?

this one

Wow. I feel really good about myself right now.

@trumi goldfish actually have really good memories

I cant spell either. Its quite frustrating when im trying to use T9 on my phone and it cant figure out what the hell im trying to type.

@uber; Apparently they have longer memories than me then :D

Thanks for the info.

Just from shallow pond fishing I can tell you that blue gill have very poor memories. Or else are just incredibly stupid.

I have trouble speaking in public. The worst are the “brain farts” that I have been afflicted with since childhood; pretty embarrassing when you lose your train of thought in front of a crowd of people. Long, uncomfortable silence…it happens while I write too, but at least I can go get a cup of coffee.

I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

Someone said that spellers are born, not made.*

I come from a family of born spellers, but I have one brother and one son who missed the gene. It’s all right. The former excels at carpentry and international finance, and the latter has an intuitive sense of the mechanics and dynamics of everything and is a natural musician.

@Bri_L, I am a visual processor and can see at a glance when things are written wrong. I also have synesthesia, which means all words come in color, and when a word is the wrong color I know it’s misspelled. But—I am not a good auditory processor, do not take things in well in meetings unless I write them down, forget what people have just told me, hate telephone calls, and seldom recognize voices. These skills too are constantly on display, and people take it for granted that everyone has them. So even though spelling isn’t my weak point, I fully sympathize.

Are there participatory websites that run on voice yet? If not, there will be.

*But that doesn’t mean people can’t improve their spelling by working at it.

@Jeruba – I have difficulty with names. I think that stems from growing up a twin. My whole life until college the focus was always on my brother and I. Then when I had to do my part and remember the other person’s name I had trouble. It didn’t help that I was the quiet one.

@Bri_L, you have a special case there. I don’t think most or maybe any of us singletons can possibly imagine what it is really like to be a twin (or triplet).

I can’t sing, I can’t dance, I don’t speak any other language, and I sometimes make really poor decisions based on flawed input. I also have a problem with reading facial expressions, except for the extreme ones. But I can spell like a bad motherfu…shush your mouth!. It’s weird, I can just look at a word and see it is spelled wrong. I am also a pretty good cook and I have a propensity for making plants flourish in my yard. Except for roses, for some reason, roses hate me.

@evelyns_pet_zebra: Dig a BIG HOLE, a REALLY BIG HOLE in the early autumn, put dug-up soil on a piece of plastic. Fill bottom half of hole with enriched (compost, peat, dead leaves, and/ or dried manure) quality soil and water.

Then place the rose (either bare-branched or from a pot) so that when you fill up the hole, the soil will hit the rose at the same spot it did in the pot. Use the lousy original soil at the very top to make a litttle moat. Jump up and down on dirt to eliminate air pockets. Water moat daily, (should get full sun) and net if you have predatory deer.

Bare-rooted roses need a little more finesse. (See this )

The only trick is in the initial hard labor when you prepare the soil.

No, the problem is my yard is shaded by a very large Walnut tree, and roses and walnut trees mix like oil and water. The key here is juglones in the soil. I have to do mostly shade gardening because NO PLACE in my yard gets more than six hours of sun a day, and it is never full sun. Even if it wasn’t for the Walnut tree, I have neighbors on both sides (east and west) with GIANT Chinese Elms (like well over 80 feet tall) and they also block the sun. The only part of my yard to get six hours of good sun is the back, and I grow tomatoes and peppers back there. So to hell with roses, I am sticking with plants I love even more, Hostas.

We took down a black walnut in our yard and dug up the roots because it poisoned everything. The juglone comes from the roots and therefore can spread over a very wide area. Our vegetable garden failed, and so did the neighbor’s. It was a chance reading of the Old Farmer’s Almanac that tipped me off to the problem.

Evelyns: I just learned what juglones are. Interesting.

@Jeruba that’s where I found out about it, as well as from several of my gardening books. I even told my neighbor about it, but his grasp of English is rather spotty, so he took it that I was telling him he couldn’t have a garden in the place near the property line. In fact, that neighbor called the cops on me once, for something else unrelated, the cop mentioned that I had told the neighbor he couldn’t put a garden there (I was like, WTF?) and when I explained to the cop about juglones in the soil, and what I had actually said to the neighbor, he just gave me an odd look, like I was making it up. As the cop walked away, I told him to look it up if he didn’t believe me. The tree is HUGE and shades both our yards. Fucking idiot cop!

Seems I have no patience for stupid people either.

I can’t complete a simple math problem to save my life. I am deathly afraid of heights. I am terrible at Grand Theft Auto. I can’t hold my liquor. I have a terrible memory, and I can’t take risks, no matter how small.
But I am a decent speller.

I do extremely well in english and I’m absolutely horrible in math.
It’s the whole right side & left side brain phenomena.

I don’t like memorizing dates or anything in history, but I do well in math. I could understand how calculus could be helpful in stuff like marketing, but not in everyday life. I’m also good at music, but can’t stand obnoxious noises like the buzzing of a fluorescent lightbulb or the high-pitched buzz of an old tv. I suck at gym though

Math.