Skills

Don't be shy. Can you do something that other people find useful, entertaining, or impressive? Don't hide it under a bushel! Instead, post here. Put your proficiency in parentheses. Add new categories and skills as appropriate.

Automotive Skills

Drive Stick Shift

Evan Miller (maniacally)

Daniel Rooney (erratically)

Brendan Dougherty (smooth as shit out of a duck's ass)

Joe Shoer '06 (that's what she said)

Katie Montgomery (could drive anything from a '82 Toyota Tercel to a forklift, or so she believes)

Jessica Chung (She learned in a week.)

Samantha Peterson (automatics are for women)

Janey Waney Lee (She doesn't even need to say anything.)

Leah Joy Weintraub (In her other life, she actually is a race car driver.)

Lucy Cox-Chapman(Better than her brother)

Jay Cox-Chapman(Worse than his sister)

Helena Harnik (I have two driving licenses, one for each side of the road. Yeah that's right- I can use either hand to shift. That makes me 2x more stick-savvy than everyone else)

Ronit Bhattacharyya (Only ever driven stick shift; now I just wish I could drive on the right side of the road) (by which I mean the left side of the road)

Anne Royston '08 (can shift from both driver's and passenger's seat; working on backseat)

Matthew Earle '07 (Double-clutch downshifts saves wear on synchros, but may have caused the expensive timing chain misalignment he just had fixed)

Drive Really Fast In Reverse

Danny Fischler once pulled a k-turn, maxing at around 20mph, across the width of a freeway entrance. With Becky frickin' Burditt in the back seat. Ca-raaaaaazy.

Sweet Jumps

David Rodriguez likes to go as fast as he can when he sees speed bumps and likes to think he gets an inch or two of air in his 2-ton SUV every time.

Change a Tire

David Rodriguez '06 has changed more than his fair share of tires and learned that salt+rust will effectively glue a wheel onto the axle. Solution? Wedge the flat edge of your hubcap-removal tool into the jammed area and whack the crap out of it with a hammer. Eventually, if you're lucky, that wheel will pop right off.

Jumpstart a Car

David Rodriguez '06 has also had his fair share of car jumpstarts and knows not to connect the black plug to red and red plug to black. If you do, you will blow the battery fuse in your fusebox and burn out some expensive component in your car. Through his learning processes, he found just how costly it is to replace the stock amp that powers your stereo.

Jonathan Landsman (who's been zapped)

Leah Joy Weintraub (but only if you ask nicely)

Parallel Park

Jonathan Landsman, native New Yorker, has parked in spots so tight that getting in and out depended on using room provided by nudging cars parked in front and behind, counting on the flexibility of their shocks. His record in Williamstown was set when moving into his Morgan East room for the Summer of 2004, when he parked at the top of Spring Street, leaving enough room on either end of the car to fit one finger, but not two.

David Rodriguez is also a native New Yorker and often takes it upon himself to giggle at the non-city folk that have such a tough time parking in huge spots on Spring Street.

Oral Skills

I can blow free-floating saliva bubbles

Brendan Dougherty

Evan Miller (I can catch it, too)

I can curl my tongue into a W

Evan Miller

David Rodriguez

Leah Shoer

I can touch my tongue to my nose

Brendan Dougherty

Lucy Cox-Chapman

I can tie a piece of string in a knot in my mouth

David Rodriguez thinks this is child's play. The real challenge is getting a cherry stem into a knot in your mouth.

I can tie a cherry stem into a knot in my mouth

David Rodriguez

Evan Miller (gimme 40 seconds)

Manual Skills

I can snap my fingers by flipping my wrist

Evan Miller (right hand only)

Ronit Bhattacharyya (both hands)

Jonathan Dahlberg - amzingly well

I can pull my fingers back to touch the back of my hand

John Chatlos can.

Other body skills

Katie Montgomery can move her ears independently of one another.

I can dislocate my...

Bonnie O'Keefe can dislocate her right hip.

Computer Languages

Perl

Kai Steverson (competent)

Evan Miller (wizardly)

Jing Cao (kind of)

Java

Daniel Rooney (disgusting)

Mathematica

Daniel Klein (is too a real language)

Joe Shoer '06 (it's my thesis, and I can do more with it than the math nerds can)

Laura Effinger-Dean '06 (I make pretty pictures for my thesis!)

Nick Yates '06 (Pretty spirals! Ooh!)

Ruby

Evan Miller (the scripting language of choice)

Ronit Bhattacharyya (the only language I can grok)

Circus Arts & other amazing feats

I can ride a unicycle!!

Alex Ambros (the 1 in 2000 girl)

Elissa Brown (in the same entry as Alex - what's the probability of that?)

Abby McBride can too!

Bryan Dragon can but doesn't want anybody to know about it.

I can slackline

Elissa Brown (shakily)

Alex Ambros

Dave Kleinschmidt (if I'm lucky)

I can juggle (balls, clubs, knives, flaming torches, etc)

Alex Ambros (working on passing clubs)

Elissa Brown (see above. We'll get it eventually)

I can swallow... (list object below)

It's only a matter of time until Daniel Klein '06 makes a joke about Your Mom here.

Other Ways of Writing English

Braille

Auyon Mukharji knows braille. :.:.:.:: : :: : .. ::. He just said "I hate you all".

Margaret Pigman

Luck

Lisetta Shah can find 4-leaf clovers pretty much just by looking down at the ground for a couple seconds, and sometimes without even that much effort.