Handedness

[Dogmantra]

I do everything right handed. I use a pen right handed, I play sports right handed (tennis and whatnot), I play musical instruments right handed, yet I have the niggling feeling that I'm actually naturally left handed. It's not just a random thought, it does have some basis in fact: my left hand is a lot more dextrous than my right, I seem to have a natural aptitude for doing things with my left hand, such as typing which is about 80% done with my left hand. I tend to go to the left of things, in that dominant eye test, where you're walking towards someone and have to swerve at the last minute without thinking, I'll go, more often than not, towards the left. For a very long time, I had some trouble with writing everything about twice as large as it should have been. My handwriting also wasn't exactly the best despite that flaw, and I reckon it has something to do with this.

I think it's because when I was learning to write, that it never really occured to me that I might be left handed, so I just did whatever was normal, which would be writing right handed. I'm kind of glad about that, actually, since I have a favourite fountain pen which I've had for a good four years, and I doubt I'd have that if I was left handed, considering the problems lefties have with smudging ink.

So uh, I guess the point of this topic is to ask a couple of questions:
1. Is this weird?
1b. Am I weird?
2. Does anyone else think the same way as I do?
3. Finally for fun: how much do you think my favourite fountain pen cost?
Hint for number three: it was 3 for £1.99

[Dr. Bath]

You know how to stop smudging? Twist the page 90 degrees and write left to right as normal (well, up to down), it's pretty simple. I always used to use fountain pens, but now I'm using much thinner paper, it's not worth it since writing with a fountain makes the other side unusable.

Sounds to me like you are right handed. Unless someone forced you or at least said that writing with the right hand was wrong when you started writing I doubt you'd naturally write righty when a southpaw. Most lefties would continue to do stuff left-handed without thinking even when told specifically that doing so was 'wrong' (My grandma always told me off for signing the cross left-handed when I was small, makes it a devil cross or something) hence the need for beating left-handed children in the past.

You're probably just a bit ambidextrous.

(On the keyboard thing, most of the most commenly used letters are on the left for some reason, so that is most likely the reason the left hand is dominant)

[Jack Squat]

I wouldn't say you're weird (well, for reasons other than being a wrong-handed :smallwink:)

My dad's left-handed, and he does everything right-handed save write. So's my friend's dad.

As far as 3 - $1.08-1.09 + tax?

[snoopy13a]

I do some things better with my left than my right and vice versa. I'm better with my left at things that require more fine control such as writing while I'm better with my right at activities that require more strength and power such as sports.

I'm not ambidexiterous as I cannot write with my right hand nor can I shoot a basketball with my left. Essentially, my handedness is spilt up.

[valadil]

Did ya know you also have a dominant eye? I didn't find this out till I started taking archery lessons. I'm right handed but left eyed, so I draw the string with my left hand (so it's closer to my better eye) which felt counterintuitive to me for a long time.

[Dogmantra]

(On the keyboard thing, most of the most commenly used letters are on the left for some reason, so that is most likely the reason the left hand is dominant)

I guess you're right, but then there's the occasion when my left hand ends up pressing keys like "u" or "k" just because it can. :smalltongue:


Sounds to me like you are right handed. Unless someone forced you or at least said that writing with the right hand was wrong when you started writing I doubt you'd naturally write righty when a southpaw.
I am very big on implications. Just in general, I often take what's implied more seriously than what's actually said. I guess it could've been implied that being right handed was better or correct because of the fact that 90% of the population do it. Of course, I am kind of going a bit too far into this... maybe.


You're probably just a bit ambidextrous.
Shush! You're not allowed to say that! You're supposed to buy into my crazy theories of strange childhoods where even then I took implied meaning as the word of god(s)!

[Temotei]

I'm mostly right handed, but strength in my arms is equal, and my left hand is my preferred for opening doors. Yep. Doors. :smallamused:

[Dr. Bath]

You know what's weird? A disproportate number of people on my physics course are left handed. Like one in five. And at the sci-fi society I attend at uni it's about 40% left-handed. Just real weird coinkydink I suppose.


I guess you're right, but then there's the occasion when my left hand ends up pressing keys like "u" or "k" just because it can. :smalltongue:

Well when you first start to type (if not touch typing) you're naturally inclined to use the left hand as the sole typing hand as it's not needed for the mouse, so even when you did start typing properly the habit of reaching for keys stayed with you.


I am very big on implications. Just in general, I often take what's implied more seriously than what's actually said. I guess it could've been implied that being right handed was better or correct because of the fact that 90% of the population do it. Of course, I am kind of going a bit too far into this... maybe.

Yeah...no. I seriously doubt you'd be influenced by anything much. I guess it's possible. And if that's the case you're the ultimate sheep! :smallbiggrin: :smalltongue:

[Eon]

so, try the violin. Much of it involves different positioning of the left hand while in the right-handed position. :smallbiggrin:

[Dogmantra]

Yeah...no. I seriously doubt you'd be influenced by anything much. I guess it's possible. And if that's the case you're the ultimate sheep! :smallbiggrin: :smalltongue:

Oh, I seriously doubt half the things that have happened to me.

Like people taking anything I say seriously. At all. Ever.

[Temotei]

Oh, I seriously doubt half the things that have happened to me.

Like people taking anything I say seriously. At all. Ever.

You said those avatars would be bad. Then you made mine into a girl, and I was satisfied. Much satisfaction going on. :smalltongue:

So maybe I shouldn't take you seriously when you're putting yourself down. :smalltongue:

[Dr. Bath]

Oh, I seriously doubt half the things that have happened to me.

Like people taking anything I say seriously. At all. Ever.

What's that? I wasn't listening because I don't care about anything you say at all ever.

[Dogmantra]

All I'm saying is that as far as some things go, secretly being left handed is rather tame. I've had a disproportionate amount of lamps blow up at me, for example. :smallwink:

[Dr. Bath]

Oh that. That's just a sign of a natural ineptitude at technology. My friend has that. He has boots made of deer that he skinned himself.

[Dragonrider]

I'm very very very very left-handed and left-eyed, but right-footed. How's that one work?


Well when you first start to type (if not touch typing) you're naturally inclined to use the left hand as the sole typing hand as it's not needed for the mouse, so even when you did start typing properly the habit of reaching for keys stayed with you.

I use my mouse with my *left* hand . . . unless it's a touchpad, in which case I go for the right.

I don't know why.


Dogmantra: both my parents, all my siblings, all my grandparents, and all my aunts and uncles are right-handed, but for some reason I've grown up using the left hand . . . so I suspect if you were naturally left-handed, it's very likely you would use it unless forced not to. I've learned to do a lot of things with my right hand (throw, because left-handed baseball mitts can be hard to find; write, for fun; crochet, so I could teach right-handed people) but no matter how much I do them - even if I do them always with my right hand instead of the left - it just always feel wrong. I don't know. Does it feel "wrong" to do things right-handed?

[SurlySeraph]

I was fully ambidexterous when I was younger. Over time I started using my right hand exclusively for drawing and writing, and my left hand for sports; and later I became fully right-handed. My handwriting was terrible, and still is pretty bad. I kinda wish I was still ambidexterous, though.

[Mauve Shirt]

I was ambidextrous, then I chose my right hand. But I hold my pencil like a left-handed person, so my mom theorizes that I was really left-handed but chose right due to my diseased right brain.

[u-gotNOgame]

I would always hold my coloring crayon in my left hand when I was really young, but my grandfather would always switch to my right hand (he's pretty oldschool). By the time I had hit an age where I had began to learn how to write traditionally he had mostly made me right handed. I like to think my penmanship suffered because of it (it's terrible if you were wondering). So now I do everything right handed, except I bat switch and shoot pool lefty.

As for other things I'm right eye'd and left foot'd. The eye thing is probably mostly random, but I think Marching Band has a lot to do with why I always, always, step off with my left foot.

-UGNG

[ScottishDragon]

If you think your left-handed try things with it.I am left-handed and i want more lefty ppl in the world.EMBRACE YOUR INNER LEFT HANDEDNESS!!

[Serpentine]

Lefty here. Sorry Dogmantra, but I think it takes a lot of very concious effort to go against your natural handedness. My grandfather was the sort who was severely discouraged (not sure whether it actually involved physical violence, but it may have) from using his left hand, and he still turned out ambidextrous.
If I write with my right hand, it looks like my handwriting in grade 2. I do some things right-handed, mostly out of necessity - golf, scissors, etc - and some out of habit - knives and forks, computer mice - but generally my left hand is superior to my right in every way. Also my left eye is not as bad as (or rather, has been getting worse more slowly than) my right.
There is one thing about left-handedness that makes me sad, though... I will never be good at caligraphy v.v Not unless I learn how to write backwards. The brush or dip pen just doesn't work properly when "pushed" from left to right, rather than pulled. And kanji? Forgeddaboudit! I had my Japanese exchange student tell me off enough for doing the lines in the wrong direction...

[ForzaFiori]

Lefty here.

Well, left handed anyway, though I bat switch. I do almost everything left handed (except computer mice, and slaps in games like blackjack). I WAS left eyed, but its gotten to be even worse than my right eye now, so i use my right more than left now. Oh, and I'm right footed. I can't do a dang thing with my left foot on a soccer field, but my right is pretty nimble.

I'm odd :smallbiggrin:

[ScottishDragon]

Lefty here.

Well, left handed anyway, though I bat switch. I do almost everything left handed (except computer mice, and slaps in games like blackjack). I WAS left eyed, but its gotten to be even worse than my right eye now, so i use my right more than left now. Oh, and I'm right footed. I can't do a dang thing with my left foot on a soccer field, but my right is pretty nimble.

I'm odd :smallbiggrin:

I am left-footed but for some odd reason i convinced myself that i was right-footed my entire life and now i can't kick in soccer at all.

[Fridesgerte]

(On the keyboard thing, most of the most commenly used letters are on the left for some reason, so that is most likely the reason the left hand is dominant)

Actually, the qwerty keyboard was developed when typewriters were all still manual, and good typists could type so fast that they jammed the keys, so they put the most common keys (e, a etc.) under the weakest fingers of the left hand to slow people down.

Anyway, I'm mostly right handed but I do some things better with my left (for example I almost always search through a bag or purse with my left hand) and I can do many things (write, use scissors) with my left hand almost as well as my right, especially if I practice. I used to switch hands in the middle of a painting and you couldn't tell which parts were done with which hand.

[Felixaar]

I'm very very very very left-handed and left-eyed, but right-footed. How's that one work?

I use my mouse with my *left* hand . . . unless it's a touchpad, in which case I go for the right.

I don't know why.

SINISTER! DEVIL CHILD!

[thubby]

I'm righty everywhere but on the slopes, i ride goofy (which i'm told is more common among lefties)