What obscure talents do you possess?

[somethingshiny]

You know you have at least one really wacky thing that you can do better than all others you know. What is it?


I am the fastest potato peeler anyone I know has ever seen. I owe it all to my mom. She made me peel 5-10 lbs of potatoes every day from the time I was 5 until I left the house at 19. That's a solid 15 yrs and an avg of 7lbs a day = over 38,000 lbs of potatoes. I have numerous scars across my hands from my flying peeler and the peels end up flung across the room, but those potatoes don't stand a chance against me!

I have terrible balance on the ground. I trip over my own feet, run myself into walls regularly and have bruises up and down my legs from running into inanimate objects. BUT, I can leap across a pitched roof with absolutely no problem. For some reason, the further from the ground, the more graceful I become. I've had this ability since I was a kid. Perhaps I should've been a chimney sweep in London.

Also, I can pick my nose with my tongue. Not that I do it, but I COULD and THAT'S the point!


eta~ thought I must've screwed the math up so I went to check it and I am still stunned at the poundage! lol

 

[NewEnglandLady]

somethingshiny, why on earth did you peel so many potatoes as a child, my dear? Did your family have potatoes at every meal? I love potatoes, maybe I should start doing that...

I have a strange talent for memorizing sheet music and lyrics to songs.

I was in marching band since junior high (yes, big dork) and couldn't understand why it took others multiple days to memorize the sheet music. I usually had it down after a few run-throughs.

Same with lyrics. While in school, if I needed to memorize something, I set it to music in my head. It was also one of the first things my DH noticed about me--he once played a song for me (that I'd never heard) and I sang it back to him word-for-word. What's odd is that he has a photographic memory.

 

[iheartscience]

I'm double jointed and can set my palm flat on a table and twist my arm around 360 degrees! I have a few other party tricks but that's probably the most impressive.

PLUS I can wiggle my ears!

 

[Porridge]

I'm amazing at parking. My dad taught me. I can park any car in any spot (providing the spot isn't actually smaller than the car )

 

[somethingshiny]

Yes, we did have potatoes every day. lol We had a family of 6 and usually 4-8 friends would join us nightly. I remember days when we'd have potato pancakes for breakfast, soup stocked with potatoes for lunch, and then meat and potatoes for supper. I only serve potatoes at MOST 3x a week now.


I've always thought it was cool to see someone with a "musical memory." I was in band for years and always had to have the sheet music in front of me to play it. Once I started playing I didn't really need the music, but I couldn't play without it.

 

[somethingshiny]

thing~ I'm double jointed to. I can do that with my feet but not with my hands. My knees ache if I do it too often though. Do your elbows or wrists start hurting??

porridge~ That is a skill to be very proud of!!

 

[Miss Sparkly]

I have an uncanny ability to state the correct time within 10 minutes. My accurate internal clock is terrible on weeks like this _ I am so anxious to get my new ring tomorrow then leave on vacation Thursday

 

[iheartscience]

thing~ I'm double jointed to. I can do that with my feet but not with my hands. My knees ache if I do it too often though. Do your elbows or wrists start hurting??

Nope, that one doesn't hurt! I can do other things but they hurt now that I'm older so I don't do them anymore! But if I had to in a pinch , I can push my thumb all the way back to my wrist, and I can also hold a stick or something with my arms out straight in front of me, shoulder width apart, and then put them behind my back without letting go of the stick or moving my hands. That one's hard to explain but it's very impressive!

I also used to be able to stand up, bend my knee so my foot is up to my butt in the back, and then take my foot and get it stuck in my rib cage!

 

[jaysonsmom]

I can wiggle my ears
I can also twitch my nose up and down like a mouse or rabbit (not flaring nostrils)
I can twirl a pen or pencil like a baton on my hand

 

[Haven]

Cool thread!

I have an extremely keen sense of smell. I'm really good at identifying ingredients in food. My family makes a game of it often.

And . . .

You know Weird Al Yankovic? He's like my brother from another mother. Since childhood I've taken pop songs and made up alternate lyrics to them. My favorite is Big Books Got Back.

 

[ksinger]

Yeah, well, don't be too thrilled about the double-jointed thing. You may be one of the lucky ones, and then again you may not. I was not. The ligament issue has caused me no end of pain as the years have gone on. Be aware and try NOT to over stress those hypermobile joints. You'll likely regret it down the road.

So yeah, double-jointed here. Can rotate my feet inward, lock my knees, and clap my feet like a seal. Pretty silly. But it also means a sprained ankle is a thing to behold, I can tell ya.

I can also wiggle my ears, although not one at a time like my uncle. I always envied that.

 

[Circe]

Near-photographic memory and speed-reading. I'm not eidetic, thank god (that sounds as much curse as blessing), but I can quote long paragraphs from memory, as well as reading a rough average of 200 pages an hour (crappy genre novel = less, Derrida = more). Got me through grad school, at least ....

 

[kenny]

Annoying people, and parallel parking perfectly on the first try every time with ZERO back and forth adjustment.

The process they taught us in Driver's Ed in High School works beautifully.

 

[DivaDiamond007]

I can touch my tongue to my nose and wiggle my ears Once upon a time (i.e. before kids) I could stand on full pointe in bare feet.

 

[Porridge]

I can twirl a pen or pencil like a baton on my hand

I always wanted to be able to do this!

 

[dragonfly411]

I can remember a lot of random things, and pick them up pretty quickly. If you tell me or show me a phone number once I can remember it for at least several days. I can tell you the author of almost any book, especially fiction. I can tell you the father, mother and grandparents of almost every arabian horse ever born. I can do the same with most quarter horses and thoroughbreds. I can remember the names of dogs, people and cats fairly easily. I can tell what kind of bird is outside just by the song, and that includes hundreds of bird species. I can tell you random things like the Titanic sank on April 14, which is also the day Abraham Lincoln was shot, but not the day he died. He died on April 15. The unfortunate thing is many times the things I remember are not the more significant things, like our President's birthday, or the formula to find a radius. It is random things that really have no value, like Secretariat's running genes skip a generation, so his direct offspring did not run well, but his grand children did.

 

[somethingshiny]

I'm sitting here thinking, "now THAT would be cool!" lol I envy all of your weird skills!

My double jointedness has already caused problems in both of my wrists so I can't do much with my hands anymore. But I can bend each of my fingers at the first knuckle so it looks like crooked witchy hands. I used to be able to sit on a chair, grab one of my ankles and twist my knee so that my leg was straight up. It hurts to even try now. I can still put my legs behind my head, but it ain't pretty!

I've always wanted to speed read. My top speed is right at 100 pages an hour. But, if I'm really enjoying the book, I slow down because I "say" the words in my head.

I am very good at remembering numbers, but terrible with names.

 

[yssie]

I can make my thumb bend to touch my forearm. Neither obscure nor a talent exactly, but I do enjoy watching DH cringe at it! I also have the uncanny ability to get lost going to a new place regardless of GPS, printed Google maps directions...


Actual talents.. I have bizarrely good pitch memory. I can "name the note" every time w/ a single piano key and I'll know if it's C#major or D, and I've never needed devices to help me tune my instruments. I can also "name the note" of the resonant frequency of the vacuum cleaner, the blender, the TV, the kettle...

 

[ame]

Im not sure I'd call this a talent but I am excellent at measuring really accurately with just eyeballing it. Especially with tile. I totally freaked out and amazed my dad with that.

I am also really good at directions especially if I am the driver. It only takes me one time to remember the way there and back usually. I have managed the navigation to and from MIL's home to both DFW airports, as well as a few important shopping meccas.

 

[yssie]

Im not sure I'd call this a talent but I am excellent at measuring really accurately with just eyeballing it. Especially with tile. I totally freaked out and amazed my dad with that.

I am also really good at directions especially if I am the driver. It only takes me one time to remember the way there and back usually. I have managed the navigation to and from MIL's home to both DFW airports, as well as a few important shopping meccas.

Ugh. I can only dream. You have NO idea how much I envy you this.

 

[JewelFreak]

Dragonfly, interesting as heck about Secretariat's get! I remember how disappointing his offspring turned out, when everybody had such high hopes for them. Great to know those genes eventually did the job.

I wish I had the memory some of you lucky souls do. I can barely remember my own name!

But I have perfect pitch. Can hear music & tell what notes are played.

The 1st knuckle on the forefinger of both hands is double jointed; I can bend those fingers upward. Used to do it in school & everybody was grossed out, never could figure why.

One UN-talent I have is not being able to remember faces. I can meet somebody, have a great conversation, then see them 2 days later & not recognize them at all by sight. (Unless they mention our talk or identify themselves.) Need to meet people at least 3 times before their faces stick in my head. Inconvenient & embarrassing! I try to recall the face 3 hrs after rapping with somebody & it's gone, can't do it.

--- Laurie

 

[Haven]

I'm very jealous of all the speed readers in this thread. One of my greatest disappointments in life is that I will never live long enough to read all of the books I want to read. My Goodreads "to read" list just keeps getting longer and longer by the day . . .

My one very silly talent is that I can curl my tongue three times. I used to be able to make five curls in it before I had it pierced.

Oh, and I speak several goofy kid languages very fluently. (Gibberish and Op Language, for example.)

 

[mogster]

I can remember people's names (even if I've met them once) and where everything is in my apartment/office/car.

The process they taught us in Driver's Ed in High School works beautifully.

Also, what is the secret to parallel parking...??

 

[yssie]

I can remember people's names (even if I've met them once) and where everything is in my apartment/office/car.

The process they taught us in Driver's Ed in High School works beautifully.

Also, what is the secret to parallel parking...??

Knowing your car.

Try turning the car in a parking lot, get a feel for its turn radius. Walk around the car and figure out what on the inside corresponds to what on the outside in terms of overall length, width, etc. On my old car for example the rear wheels were in the same vertical plane as the little latches just behind the doors where the seatbelts came out, so I knew if I lined the seatbelt latch up to the backend of the car I was trying to park behind I'd be in perfect position...

After a few times it becomes second-nature - you just kinda get a feel for it, you don't need to line things up visually any more. I could parallel park my old car like a pro - in a spot with hardly any room to spare in two moves with ten minutes to go before class. I also backed it onto a truck w/ just those two wheel-rails once - definitely nervous w/ that one though!

 

[ksinger]

Oh wait, I remembered one, or two maybe.

I can tell actors in movies. Like, even if I don't know their names and have only seen them one time, and they're in serious makeup, I can almost always tell you that "he was the butler in that movie we saw last year on XYZ channel. If we're watching a movie and I go, "Oh, LOOK who it is!", my husband is immediately annoyed. Drives him nuts as I trot out that person's filmography from memory.

And I can remember pop lyrics to songs that I haven't heard in 30 years. But really, music as a mnemonic for words is how pre-literate cultures stashed those oral histories, so I don't necessarily consider that something special. Most humans can do it to one degree or another.

I always wanted perfect pitch, but don't have it, just excellent relative pitch. I guess that's really all that's necessary to be musical anyway, but oh to be able to just sing a G or whatever was asked, without thinking about it. How cool would that be? Oh well, maybe next life.

 

[ame]

Im not sure I'd call this a talent but I am excellent at measuring really accurately with just eyeballing it. Especially with tile. I totally freaked out and amazed my dad with that.

I am also really good at directions especially if I am the driver. It only takes me one time to remember the way there and back usually. I have managed the navigation to and from MIL's home to both DFW airports, as well as a few important shopping meccas.

Ugh. I can only dream. You have NO idea how much I envy you this.

I don't know where I got it. My parents I guess are ok. My DH gets so pissed that I have landmarks when I give directions. Well I will remember there being a QT or a McDonalds there...

 

[ame]

Oh I didn't even think about music. I am particularly good at ID'ing the band, and in most cases the song by the band, within the first 5 notes. Especially hairbands. lol

I have won us many many trivia nights this way.

 

[kenny]

The process they taught us in Driver's Ed in High School works beautifully.

Also, what is the secret to parallel parking...??

First practice this a few times on a street with no traffic so you are not stressed out by cars in traffic that are stuck behind you.

To get the basics down let's first assume your car is the same size as the one you are going to park behind, lets call it car B. (more on this later)
There are 3 moving stages.
Knowing when to start and end the 3 stages is key.

1. Pull next to car B as closely as possible. (this is key and being afraid to do this is the main mistake people make)
2. Stop when your seat is lined up with driver's seat of car B.
3. Quickly turn steering wheel hard fully CW and slowly back up, watching your passenger-side exterior mirror to ensure you don't touch B's rear bumper, which won't happen if you did step 1 and 2 correctly.
4. When your head is in a straight line with B's bumper quickly turn your steering wheel CCW to straighten your front tires.
5. Continue back till you judge that the front right edge of your bumper is nearest to B's rear bumper.
6. Turn steering wheel hard fully CCW.
7. Continue back very slowly till your front right tire just touches the curb.
8. Straighten steering weel.

Now if car B is shorter or longer than yours the change step 2.
Instead of positioning your car so your seat is lined up the the front seat of B, position your car so your rear bumper is lined up with the rear bumper of car B - this takes some getting used to.

Again the moving 3 stages are:
Moving back with steering wheel fully CW.
Moving back with steering wheel straight.
Moving back with steering wheel fully CCW.

As a general rule turning the wheels with the car stopped wears out tires BUT it will make your parallel parking more sucessful.

 

[AmeliaG]

OK, I'll only admit this here because most people think it is strange. I have memories from before I was 3 years old. Including running away to find my father in the middle of the night. The only people that believe me are my parents who had to pick me up at the police station and could verify what I told them with what the police told them. I thought everybody could remember that far back; obviously not.

And I am a pro at remembering the odd useless fact. I can't remember full lineages of Secretariat like Dragonfly but for some reason I can remember Nearco, his champion Italian forebearer, and Prince Rose, his champion Belgian forebearer.

 

[ImperfectGirl]

I'm double jointed and can set my palm flat on a table and twist my arm around 360 degrees! I have a few other party tricks but that's probably the most impressive.

PLUS I can wiggle my ears!

I can do both of these too!