LOL, Jim! I know how you feel - I go through that daily.

Jim,

You are too old for what? If opening a box of crackers barehanded is your idea of success, then you are doomed.
But you are smart enough to find tools to help, and funny enough to come here and talk about it, so I say you are doing fine :)

Join the crowd! I have trouble pulling apart the plastic bags with cheese and lunchmeat in (the ones they come in), and that's just one thing I will mention.

Oh, it's not the opening of those bags, it is the re-closing of those stooopid things. I could never work in a grocery deli, everyone would walk away with their stuff on the floor!

Jim

Guess, I am to old too? I got some anica, when my joints were very painful last time.

YIKES, there was no way to open it with my sore finger joints. I needed to use pliers!

Why would they make a pain med of any kind so hard to open?

Moni

I just ended up this week using a screwdriver to pry open my pain medicine I got this week. That lid will never fit back on it.

Sue

It's not just you, I think some of this packaging must be less consumer friendly than it used to be. I had to get a knife to get a piece of shrink wrapped cheese open last night, and scissors this morning to open some handwarmer packets - so I could tape them to the hummingbird feeders that were turning snow cone-ish about every hour and a half.
Now if I couldn't do it in the kitchen, how would someone with cold clumsy hands manage the handwarmers outside where they'd usually be used.

Jim, you sure gave me a good laugh. Don't know why, but things do seem to be harder to open these days. Whew! I thought it was just me.

I have an awful time with jars. I've had a large jar of pickles that I tried and tried to open and finally gave up until my GD's DH opened it for me when they were here. I like to make those fire and ice pickles out of store-bought ones.

Thanks for the chuckle and see, you aren't alone!

Both cracker sleeves and cereal liners! By the time I get them ripped open, cereal is spilled onto the counter and the tear is usually halfway down the bag, so it doesn't pour neatly, either. I always have to keep the bag closed with a clothespin.

I also hate, hate the foil on ketchup bottles and vinegar jugs. I can never get them opened neatly.

I'm glad I'm not alone. Every package is challenging anymore to open.

When we get together, I hand my pull-top pop can to my sister to open, and she hands me the bottles with twist off caps to open for her.

Shirley

I don't think it's age. Those packages have always been hard to open. I can't remember a time when I didn't use scissors to open them.

I *USED* to have a strong left hand. I could open jars my DH couldn't open. No more. I think I've passed 'the end' -- at least the end of opening stuff.

My favorite story is about buying a pair of scissors for the condo (to do things like cut open cereal liners and lunchmeat packs). The scissors came in hard plastic packaging. We needed a screwdriver and a hammer to break into the package -- because, of course, we didn't have a pair of scissors to do the job!

Thank you Jim !! Here I was......thinking......it was only "me" !!! By The Way........you are soooooo funny !! You made me LOL !!!!!!!! : )

I never use to understand these comments, but in recent years I've become a victim too. I actually use a pair of pliers to open some cleaning supplies! I'm too old, too!!

I use scissors tons to open things up by cutting or stabbing.

I use the old can opener and pop up the lids on jars.

There are others that it won't work and so I slam it sohard over and over against the sink until it finally works.

Again I stab the foil tops they put in and stick my thumb/finger in and get it all off or most or sometimes, just keep stabbing it to make a big enough hole so the ketchup,etc. will work.

I have been tempted to go back to store at times and ask one of them to do it for me.

Of course, it is stronger glue!
Age has nothing to do with it.
(I had a birthday yesterday so I know age is not the problem.)
LOL

Like many of you, my scissors get used for a lot more things than normal cutting. And how about those childproof medicine lids that we adults can't open, but a child can. Even some toilet bowl cleaners now have that push down, then turn type of lid that I can never get to open. Those silver foil liners in bottles are impossible to remove without stabbing them first with scissors.

I totally understand, just had to have Lauren open a catsup lid because I couldn't unscrew it to open it. Everything is harder to open for me. I'm a nurse and the bags of iv fluids are hard to open. They have a slit that is supposed to tear open but they hardly ever do. I always keep a pair of scissors in my pocket. Then there is the stuff on food trays, particularly the desserts. 99% of our patients are over 50 and they can never open them...I can barely open them. Why do that have to be so hard to open?!!!

I really hate things sealed in plastic. I always cut myself trying to cut them open and the plastic is sharp as a knife.

Jim,you've too funny!!
I can't for the life of me ever get those bags in the cereal boxes open.Always have to resort to scissors,I have to use a small straight edge screw driver to open jelly jars and the like the first time.
Kathi

Ditto, ditto, ditto!

Latest experience: a bottle of Aleve caplets. The bottle is squat, no more than 2 and a half inches high. You have to squeeze 2 "tabs" on the sides inward while turning the lid counterclockwise. Not so easy when your head or shoulder or back is killing you! I also always request the non-childproof prescription-pill containers and check before I walk out of the store. (No kids in my house.)

I also have a poorer hand grip than in my younger days. I've taken to keeping a rubber band in my purse. If I'm out and grab a bottle of something to drink, and the lid's hard to budge (sometimes I think the soda bottles miss a part of the assembly line, it's like there's no partial cut around the cap) -- then I tighten the rubber band around the lid, and it turns easily.

But I really needed a bottle of water last week, and I actually asked the cashier to open it for me! (I've also had a co-worker do it for me more than a few times.)

For jars in the kitchen, a couple smacks on the counter edge will loosen them up (so far, no issues with the glass cracking, as I aim just to dent the rim in a couple spots).

Oh, yes. Add me to that list. I keep scissors in my kitchen drawer with the knives, etc. Recently my DS noticed i was having a problem opening something and he asked me if I had pliers. I said I did and he told to keep them in the drawer also. He said pliers are the indispensable kitchen tool. He was right.

With jelly, pickle and similar jars, I turn them upside down on a bowl and run hot water over them. After a while they open easily. With a gallon of milk, even the pliers don't work. The plastic screw top is made with a thin strip of plastic at the bottom. I have to use the point of a steak knife to pry under it and slice it off; then the top screws off easily.

Seriously, I blame all of this on that woman who mixed up the Tylenol bottles in hopes of killing her husband.

Sue

And then to make it worse. I see young people (anyone under 40) twist the tops of beer bottles. They look at me real strange when I ask for a 'church key' to get the job done.

Jim

If I buy a bottle of water, I ask the cashier to open it for me. I think it is rediculous how hard it is to open an Aleve bottle. Aren't us old folks the ones using Aleve. I always silently cuss that women who tampered with the Tylenol bottles.

One day I came out of the dollar tree store and had gotten a bottle of pepsi to drink for doing all that hard work(shopping).I was sitting in the car with the door open trying to open that blasted thing,when this real nice young lady walked up and said"can I help you with that"?? Of course I said yes and she just twisted it right off.I thanked her and told her this is what happens when you get older,she just laughed,and said that's what my parents always say.
Kathi

My husband and I have a pair of sissors hanging on the side of the cabnets in the kitchen just for that purpose....
and yes...we are getting old.

patti

My husband and I have a pair of sissors hanging on the side of the cabnets in the kitchen just for that purpose....
and yes...we are getting old.

patti

Sue-va -- I use Jim's 'church key' to separate the plastic rim from the screw cap on gallons of milk -- not that I can easily LIFT a gallon anymore. I also use the 'key' to pry under a screw cap on a glass container to release the pressure seal -- if I can't get the metal top to expand and open with hot water.

I'm joining the club with being unable to open so many things. I love Costco and it is the most likely place I shop; but their packaging is just too tough. I believe much of the 'over' packaging is to deter shoplifting and with food products (and pharmacy) it is for safety. Once more.... the few make life difficult for the many.

Yes, you were at the end of the box. That's better than being in the middle of the box.

I must admit that the gallon jugs of milk we buy at costco are less stress...they have a special corner that you can sit on the counter and pour...

Chisue, I'll have to try that trick with a church key on the gallon milk bottle. And yes, it is heavy. When I open one I pour half into a plastic 1/2 gallon lidded pitcher and put it in the freezer, so then I'm only lifting 1/2 gallons. Every little bit helps.

As to the cereal bags, I cut the top off, with scissors of course, then empty the cereal into a Tupperware lidded container. Stays fresh and no spilling. Oh, and the boxes get recycled. Same with potato chips except I put them in a storage or freezer bag and keep them in the fridge. They stay fresh longer in the fridge.

Ah, modern conveniences!

Sue

Hi there, Jim Dandy,

Was that word in your first line, "tired" ... or "tried" ... cause I don't see too good, any more?!

If you don't have scissors, but there's a pencil in your pocket, grab the pack with two fingers on each side of the middle of the end, holding tight ...

... and ram the pencil point through the stubborn end of that package!

What's that?

You hadn't found the pencil sharpener yet?

Well ... so much for that idea. Guess one can't win 'em all, right?

Good wishes for many more years of instigating merry-making.

ole joyfuelled

I did not notice my typo until later in the day (tired vs. tried). By that time so many people had figured it out and went on from there.

Really...I used to be able to just pull apart that stuff. It cannot be me, it must be the glue! The woman who lives with me has been doing the scissors things for years. Not because she cannot open the package, she does it just to irk me.

Jim

Pliers, church keys, knives - I make good use of all of them. I use a knife to separate the plastic rim from the cap on milk jugs. Holding the knife horizontally, you can easily cut through the little plastic threads holding the two pieces together.

Now if car manufacturers would eliminate those blanket blank gas caps that have to be turned to "click" when closing. Opening it isn't a problem, but I've resorted to a good pair of adjustable pliers to get it clicked closed. (I do that little operation once I'm back home.) Thank heavens that works like a charm, would hate to have the malfunction light come on for just giving up and leaving it unclicked.