What was the last skill you learned and how?

fool@programming.dev to Asklemmy@lemmy.ml – 63 points –

It can be a small skill.

The last thing I learned to do was whistle. Never could whistle my whole life, and tutorials and friends never could help me.

So, for the last month or two, I just sort of made the blow shape then spam-tried different "tongue configurations" so to speak -- whenever I had free time. Monkey-at-a-typewriter type shit. It was more an absentminded thing than a practice investment.

Probably looked dumb as hell making blow noises. Felt dumb too ("what? you can't whistle? just watch"), but I kept at it like a really really low-investment... dare I attract self-help gurus... habit.

Eventually I made a pitch, then I could shift the pitch up a little, then five pitches, then Liebestraum, then the range of a tenth or so. Skadoosh. Still doing it now lol.

(Make of this what you will: If I went the musician route my brain told me to, then I would've gotten bored after 1 minute of major scales. When I was stuck at only having five pitches, I had way more longevity whistle-blowing cartoonish Tom-and-Jerry-running-around chromaticisms than failing the "fa" in "do re mi fa".)

So, Lemmings: What was the last skill you learned? And further, what was the context/way in which you learned it?

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Reading the Cyrillic alphabet.

It's not anywhere near as hard as it seems and there are so many times you encounter it.

What'd you learn it for (I personally don't see it often so you likely live near a Cyrillic-heavier region) and how? Also

I kept seeing more and more things in Cyrillic especially because of the war in Ukraine, so gradually learned more and more of it online, now I know at least all the letters used in Russian. Now I can read Cyrillic, although only very slowly, basically I do it like an elementary school child.

I live in Austria for context, no neighboring countries with the Cyrillic alphabet.