My mother breast-fed me with powdered milk. It was my first real do-it-yourself project.

The line is a compact piece of self-deprecating humor built on an absurd image: a mother “breast-feeding” with powdered milk, which would normally be mixed and bottle-fed. The joke pivots on the phrase “do-it-yourself,” suggesting the speaker’s independence (or neglect) began at infancy—so early that he had to “assemble” his own nourishment. Beneath the gag is a satirical nod to modern convenience culture and the way people mythologize self-reliance. The exaggeration also functions as character sketch: the speaker presents himself as someone shaped by improvisation, thrift, or a slightly dysfunctional upbringing, turning it into a comic origin story.