Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Millennial males........is it just me?

I didn't read through all the posts, but just in the last week I heard a story of a young adult male(early 20's) who came to a local tire shop with a low tire. Said he figured out where to put air in it but he didn't want to take that little nut thingy off the wheel because he figured the air would leak out faster than what he could put it in. It's both scary and downright embarrassing how much catching up a lot of young adults need to learn just to get through the basics in life. If they ever can.

It all comes down to your dad or some other 'old' smart bastards who are willing to teach you stuff.


That sure helps anyway.


And I'll be the first to admit that I was born a dumb ass.....still am....grin

T

That's what I was thinking. I've been reading this thread and thinking "gee where can I meet some girls like that?"

I grew up in the suburbs but my Dad grew up on a farm. My truck is an '04 1500 getting ready to hit 300,000. I may not have the skills of a kid raised in the country but I can shoot, wrench, and run with the kids raised in the country and fit in. It's about necessity. My folks weren't going to pay to fix my truck so I had to either do it myself or get a job to pay someone else to.

In the land of Oz..........

Welcome to the Fire.

Let me be the first to welcome you properly.......

GFY!

I'm a millennial and my Dad is an auto mechanic. I grew up hunting and fishing with him and other mechanics and I was sheltered from mechanic work mostly because my Dad didn't do it at home and I don't think he wanted me to go down that road.

With that said if I didn't know how to change a tire,or my own oil. I'd kick my own ass.

[/quote]Jim- So is it considered bad form to ask about the size of ones ranch? [/quote]

Some consider it similar to asking how much money you have in the bank.

There are some different skill sets involved though.

This here stuff I do on this forum is the Zenith of my computer skills.

If I had to rely on my computer skills to survive, I probably would not make it.


Of course I could buy a map and head to the country.......cook a rabbit.

This is really what my OP was about. Not so much about working on cars. Just basic stuff - like replacing a rubber washer on a garden hose, or fixing a flat on a kid's bike. Or digging a hole......

True story.....
This winter, I attempted to instruct four young guys on how to clear an iced up flangeway. These weren't computer geeks or baristas - they were forklift operators. They were poking at it with sticks and a grain shovel. I told them we could clear the problem in a few minutes with a couple of picks - "Where's you pick. I'll show you how". Blank stares. "Your pick", I say, "do you have one?" They all look at each other, apparently each hoping the others will know. One asks, "what"? I say, "a pick - like a miner uses" - and I mime swinging a pick over my head. Another guy holds out a stick with a metal chisel point on one end - "you mean like this?"

I would have bet any amount of money, until this time, that I could take any four guys off the street, and at least one of them would know what a pick was and how to use it.This was a real eye opener.

It's not just you. And it's not just millennials, unfortunately.

There is an ad on tv for an insurance company. The 23 year old girl does the talking, and her 23 year old boyfriend just stands there, batting his eyes.
And she says "Thank God I got the breakdown included on my car insurance policy. This made sure that he got home safely the other night, after all, he had a flat tire!" The guy stands there, looking admiringly at his girlfriend.

Good Lord! Millennial Boy does not know how to change a tire.
Thirty years ago they never would have run an ad like this. Adult males were expected to be able to change a tire.

We are seeing the feminization of the adult male [hard to call them men] in America today.

I stayed out of this conversation, but the story about the pick got me. Was replacing a fence post this past weekend at my house. The fence separates my yard from my neighbors yard. He sees me working on it and comes out, says he'll help. Mostly, he watched me and talked. He did go get his one shovel that was one of those short, emergency shovels you keep in a vehicle and attempt to dig some dirt from around the concrete but could see he was doing no good, so he left it to me. Anyways, I had a long bar that I use to pry rocks, etc. from tight holes and was using it to see if the concrete block was loose yet. Kid was amazed, told me that having something like that would be really handy to have to use to cut through ice in the winter when it builds up. I asked if he had a pick. He didn't know what it was. I was amazed anyone could grow to adulthood and not know what a pick was. The kid is nice enough and I try to be nice to him and help him out when I can. It is obvious that he was never taught anything. Guess what? He's a computer nerd with a degree in Information Systems. I'm sure he's good at what he does, but no one ever told him or showed him about what it takes to just maintain your own residence. After I pulled the 150+lb concrete block out of the hole with my vehicle he did help me carry it to a corner of my lot. Funny thing, though. Even though I'm about 25 years older than me, when we went to grab the block, he saw one end was bigger than the other and commented that he'd let me get the heavy end! I would have never thought of doing or saying something like that when I was working with an older guy. I like the kid well enough, though, and like to have good neighbors so I don't give him crap OR harass him about being from Nebraska!

I was just thinking about my sons and their friends. One son works in the public utility field building substations and the other is a commercial fisherman in Alaska. Their friends include a lineman, Army Ranger, farmers, foresters, a carpenter, and others I know I'm forgetting. Friends sons are foresters, mechanics in the Air Force, construction workers and pilots in the Coast Guard. None of these are what I'd consider pussy jobs. I'll assume that they all know how to change the oil in a car or a flat tire.

The current television advertising campaign certainly feminizes men.

I was born in 1980. Not sure if that means I'm a millennial or what. I do own a pick. If you plant trees in my part of Missouri you must own a pick. And a rock bar. I've changed a head gasket on my Honda Civic that you really need to have arms the size of a 4 year old and 3 elbows to do easily. I've remodeled houses. Plumbing. Electrical. Tile and wood flooring. Pretty decent at it if I must say.

But at the risk of being lumped in with man bun wearing no tire changing millennials, what's an iced up flangeway?

A guy was telling me a story a couple weeks ago about a millennial male and his girlfriend. Apparently they got a flat tire and didn't know how to fix it. The guy with a beard that belies his true femininity was standing over his girlfriend as SHE changed the tire. He stood there watching a YouTube video about how to change a flat and relayed the directions to his girlfriend. She was doing all the work and he stood there barking orders while watching a video. The pussification of the American male continues.

Since changing a tire has now been identified as a basic skill, I'll be brave and ask if anyone else had to read the directions when they encountered a modern scissors jack. There's always been, and still is, a floor jack with a 2'x2' piece of plywood in my cars. My sister has not continued this family practice.

No. Anytime you have to either ask directions or read directions, you lose some testosterone. The wife's Mountaineer had a flat last Fall and the spare had never even been off. She read the directions and told me how you were supposed to do it, while I did it. Terribly complicated compared to the old ways, but the new stuff really saves space.

Well, I have changed many a tire in my 76 years, but I will confess having nothing but trouble with a large new Chevy Suburban when I stopped to help an older lady with a flat. Struggled for half an hour trying to crank down the spare, couldn't hit the hole with the crank, couldn't even SEE the hole. Finally a stout young guy stopped and helped us out, he had one of the ultrabright new flashlites that allowed us to get the crank in where it belonged. Vehicle was stopped on the gravel on a sharp grade, made things interesting trying to jack it up. Neither one of us would have got the job done without reading the directions in the owners manual, tools were hidden in some very hard to find nooks and crannies.

I've never had a problem hitting the hole with my crank even when I couldn't see it.

In your defense though, you elderly gents had to deal with a heavier forest than the women of today.

Had to change a tire for a lady a few months ago. She had some sort of minivan. She had no idea where the jack was or even where the spare tire was. Neither did I. I had to get out the owners manual and look it up. Jack was stuffed in some little hidey hole that you would never even think to look in. Spare tire was under the car, but could not be seen anywhere, even when laying flat on the ground and looking under the car. Of course it was dark so that didn't help. Turned out the spare was right smack dab in the middle of the undercarriage. Had to take out a plastic panel in between the two front bucket seats and then turn a nut that let the spare drop down. I swear I had to turn that nut several hundred rotations before the cable had enough slack to enable me to pull the spare tire out from under the car. What a royal PIA. Got the job done for her, though.