Somewhat ironic this comes in a day after I sewed a hole in the armpit of a tee shirt I like. Doesn't really vibe with the target audience of a site like 'Hacker News'...
Hacking essentially means the exact opposite of buying and throwing away stuff (a cycle known as consumerism i.e. being a sheeple). Fixing and modifying all kind of things to suit your weird imagination is the core idea of hacking. The skill of mending applies to software too, of course.