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Adults don’t always have it figured out, do they?
The answer to that question is a huge NO.
When you’re a kid, you probably think that adults know how to do everything, but then you get older and you realize that pretty much everyone is totally clueless.
Here are some true stories from AskReddit users about being surprised at what adults don’t know how to do.
1. Two stories.
“I’ve got two. A girl I knew in college. Her dad called once to remind her that every so often she needed to put oil in her truck. She did. Then her truck started smelling like french fries and then died.
Even after trying to explain it, she couldn’t understand that this was directly related to the quart of vegetable oil she put in the motor.
Another time, another party back in college, a guy demonstrated how to shotgun a beer by shoving a steak knife into it and twisting it. Also some of his hand. He panicked like crazy. Made all kinds of noises and waved his hand around freaking out and getting blood all over. He was a bit drunk, though, and these things happen.
He got a bandage on it a minute later and he was fine.”
2. Ummmm…
“When my friend bought a house a month into home ownership she asked me, very pissed off, when the city was coming to cut her lawn because it’s starting to look like weeds .
It was awkward when I had to explain that she needs to cut her own lawn or hire someone.”
3. Come on!
“I had to jump a friends car that wouldn’t start.
It had a hard time but I finally got it running. She immediately turns off the car and says, “thanks so much I’ll call you later!””
4. Too many rules.
“Had to ask my roommate to please wash his hands after touching raw chicken. He was cool to just…go about his day before I asked. He thought I was being a wacko neat freak.
Same guy also thought his sheets wouldn’t fit in the washing machine so he just…never washed them.
When I asked him please not drop silverware down the garbage disposal and leave it he said I had too many house rules.”
5. You must empty it!
“My ex best friend had told me that she had needed to buy another new vacuum cleaner, the 3rd that month.
I asked her what was wrong with it and she said “It’s not picking things up anymore!” So I asked if she had dumped out the container… she didn’t know that was a thing.”
6. What day is it?!?!
“I work graveyard shift and I had to explain to a coworker that at midnight, 12:00 am/0000 hours, it is the start of a new day.
She then had an anxiety attack because I was telling her that “today is not Monday anymore, today is Tuesday now”.”
7. Not really up on things.
“I had to teach my boss how to “go down to the next line” by hitting Enter on his computer keyboard.”
8. Hahahaha.
“I had a friend who I noticed took Mucinex A LOT.
I’ve used it occasionally, when I’ve been congested, but it seemed abnormal how often I saw him taking it. I finally asked him why he was taking it one time, because he didn’t seem sick at all, and he looked puzzled and said “well, I think I’m getting sick”.
I pressed further and he said “because it’s an expectorant”. It turns out he thought “you take an expectorant when you are EXPECTING to get sick”.”
9. What does that mean?
“Girl I went to HS with: “why do people say a quarter of an hour? Like what does that even mean?”
Me: “it’s 15 minutes. Because 15 is a fourth of 60, so that’s a quarter of an hour”
Her: looking at me like I’m a fucking idiot “But a quarter is 25…”
Me: …”
10. A smart one!
“My wonderful, selfless, beautiful younger brother asked me how to make ice last year.
He’s 24.”
11. You gotta peel those!
“Friend from college tried making burrito bowls for dinner and complained that some of the onions were weirdly chewy. She didn’t know onions need to be peeled.
She asked me if not greasing the pan when making banana bread was okay, because she didn’t have anything to grease it with. She had canola oil, olive oil, and butter. She thought you could only use Pam which I informed her was just sprayable oil.
She won’t cook raw meat, because it’s gross and she doesn’t know how to tell if it’s cooked well enough to not get sick. I taught her how to make tea, how to mop, how to do laundry, how to make scrambled eggs.
She has the type of mom that does all the cooking and cleaning, but I don’t understand why she wouldn’t have tried to pass that to her daughter.”
12. Slow computer.
“In the late 90s.
Had a co-worker who complained about her PC being slow. Took a look and the hard drive was full. Largest folder was her recycle bin. She had never ever emptied it in years of use. I emptied recycle, cleared Temp folder and PC started working fine.
She was happy until….. Her big excel tracking sheet was gone. Oh No. She did not know where it was on file explorer, so I asked her to show me how she opened it. She goes to the little storage container on her desktop, named Recycle Bin, and it was normally at the top, but now it’s gone. No backup. Oops…
She cried to management that I ‘destroyed her computer’. Manager laughed when I told her the truth.”
13. Where am I?
“This is like 10 years ago. I was dating a 32 year old and he asked me if I wanted to get together to watch a TV show. I said sure, what time is it on. He looks it up and says to me “8 Pacific 9 Central…?”
I asked what was confusing him and he told me he wasn’t sure if the show was on at 8 or 9. My man did not know what timezone we lived in.
So I was like “Ok, well you know what ocean we’re near, right?” cuz I was trying to get him to think about the Pacific timezone in terms of the giant body of water for which it was named and he immediately got defensive and for real said “Why would I know that? I’m from Texas.”
He’d been living in San Francisco for 5 years and could see the Pacific Ocean out his window.”
14. Tell me about it.
“Worked at an on campus store that sold a lot of essentials for students living at dorms.
I had one girl ask me what laundry detergent was because she never did laundry. She asked if I could help her do her laundry but I declined as I couldn’t leave the register, which of course she was mad about.
Sorry I have to actually do my job lady.”
15. Money problems.
“This is going to sound weird, but manage a budget. Or just in general being money smart.
One of my old roommates was really bright academically, but he was terrible with money. Each semester he would start off with a pile of cash from his parents and roughly blow through it after about two months.
I first noticed it with his dining dollars on campus. Every day it seemed like he would buy the most expensive sushi option on campus everyday. We’re talking maybe $18.00 which isn’t terrible if it’s once in a while, but this was every day.
It’s also college dining hall sushi, so the quality was also just okay without even considering the money spent. Of course around midterms when his dining dollars would run out and he’d sort of panic and whine that he couldn’t afford anything.
But what was so strange, is that when he would start to low, he’s sort of laugh about not knowing anyway we could avoid going broke while continuing to buy the most expensive option. But he’d also get really defensive when people wanted to talk to him about this.
Eventually when he moved off campus it was the same thing. For the first two months he’d feast. He’d get delivery constantly, ordering just way too much food, and of course he’d never share it.
But then once he’d nearly run out of cash, he’d buy like an emergency 50 pack of hot dogs and only eat that for the rest of the semester, while telling everyone else that they were lucky they had money to spend, and how not everyone had it so easy when it comes to money.
He’d never directly say it, but there were always a lot of implied insults.”
Have you ever had any experiences like this?
If so, please share them with us in the comments.
Thanks!
