The only lefty in the village?

[mike257]

I'm another one - think we had a similar thread a couple of years ago and there turned out to be tons of us.

Pretty much the only things I do left handed are writing and drumming (like Dad3353 I have to set my kit up lefty style, although I can make a half-passable effort on a righty kit)

[Happy Jack]

I'm a righty who plays right-handed.

Based on this thread, I must be pretty unusual ...

[Silvia Bluejay]

[quote name='Happy Jack' timestamp='1378980842' post='2207240']
I'm a righty who plays right-handed.

Based on this thread, I must be pretty unusual ...
[/quote]

[Marc S]

[quote name='Happy Jack' timestamp='1378980842' post='2207240']
I'm a righty who plays right-handed.

Based on this thread, I must be pretty unusual ...
[/quote]

It seems there are a few of you about, so you are not alone
Anyhow, there is no such thing in life as "normal" - is there?

EDIT: I'm guessing but you must be all the members NOT replying to the thread lol

Edited September 12, 2013 by Marc S

[Evil Undead]

Another over here! Left handed, play bass right handed.

I do everything else the left handed way, including knife and fork

[pietruszka]

I don't get this knife and fork thing. I thought it was left handed to have the fork in your left hand, but it seems not! When I visit my girlfriend's parents with her, they set the table with the wine glass/glass/cup on the left side for me. I admit it looks very odd against everything being on the right hand side!

I do most things right handed, I suppose I've just had to get used to things being right handed, ie bread knives, tin openers, scissors, etc But veg peelers are impossible right handed.

Whats the one thing lefties here really struggle with?



Dan

[Marc S]

[quote name='pietruszka' timestamp='1378987513' post='2207361']
I don't get this knife and fork thing. I thought it was left handed to have the fork in your left hand, but it seems not! When I visit my girlfriend's parents with her, they set the table with the wine glass/glass/cup on the left side for me. I admit it looks very odd against everything being on the right hand side!

I do most things right handed, I suppose I've just had to get used to things being right handed, ie bread knives, tin openers, scissors, etc But veg peelers are impossible right handed.

Whats the one thing lefties here really struggle with?



Dan
[/quote]

I don't get the way right-handers use their knives & forks either

I'm not sure what I "struggle" with most
I use right handed scissors, tin-openers etc and seem to get on well enough with all these things....
I used to struggle, when sharing an office and computers with right handers
However, I learned to be more ambidextrous with the mouse too....

Marc

[Norm]

i'm right handed but left footed. Ride (rode!) a skateboard/ surfboard goofy style, played footie predominantly left footed but worked real hard to get right foot better but never as good or natural as left. The only anomaly is shooting, give me a rifle or shotgun & I'll put it to my left shoulder, rh feels totally alien & uncomfortable. :-)

[PaulWarning]

I was proud to be a lefty, blame Macca, so I never tried to learn right handed, wish I had now. A few months ago I bought a drum kit and decided to play it right handed, no problems at all. I do wonder if Hendrix would have been as good right handed though.
I think some people are more left handed than others, if that makes sense

[Marc S]

[quote name='PaulWarning' timestamp='1378991130' post='2207434']

...I think some people are more left handed than others, if that makes sense
[/quote]

It makes perfect sense to me

[leftybassman392]

[quote name='PaulWarning' timestamp='1378991130' post='2207434']
I was proud to be a lefty, blame Macca, so I never tried to learn right handed, wish I had now. A few months ago I bought a drum kit and decided to play it right handed, no problems at all. I do wonder if Hendrix would have been as good right handed though.
I think some people are more left handed than others, if that makes sense
[/quote]

James May time!

It's actually a sliding scale that almost everybody is on somewhere. It's pretty rare for somebody to be so completely one-sided that they can't do anything the other way round. Personally I'm pretty close to the Lefty end, but not so much that I can't do anything Righty.

As to cause, most studies seem to point to genetics as playing a key role. Here's a half-decent Wiki article. I found the bit on handedness in sport pretty interesting. Nothing on handedness in music though - which is a shame.

[url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left_handedness"]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Left_handedness[/url]

(Just so we're clear, I did know about this already and just dug up something that folks can read, ok?)

Edited September 12, 2013 by leftybassman392

[Marc S]

Another question / observation thingy
Years back, someone told me that left handed people can't dance
He obviously saw me on the dancefloor!

Anyhow, I continued to find other left-handers who are all equally bad at dancing as me
I was at a celidh a few years back, with 2 left-handed colleagues
and both these young ladies admitted to being bad dancers...

We all watched the other dancers, and the usual pattern to celidh dancing seemed easy enough,
however, when we were forcibly dragged into the group, we managed to completely destroy the whole dance!

I'm terrible at all sorts of dancing
and to this day, I've only ever knowingly met one good dancer who was a lefty
and he had to work really really hard to get any good at all
while other pals who started the same time picked it up more quickly....

Any thoughts / observations on this point?

NB. Bad dancers are said to have "two LEFT feet" - not two right feet!

Marc

[Silvia Bluejay]

I once tried to attend a choreographed modern dance course. Lasted one lesson.
All movements were optimised for right-handed people. The right leg and arm were always the leading ones, the pirouettes or turns were always devised so that you had to get into the correct movement in a "naturally" right-handed direction, and obviously when you had to hold hands or do any action with another person, you had to use your right hand first and foremost.
Horrendous.
I was a good dancer in my youth, before my feet gave way. My bunions and joints now only allow me to bop around a little for a few minutes, on a good day.

[BassTractor]

[quote name='Marc S' timestamp='1379273801' post='2210744']
Any thoughts / observations on this point?
[/quote]


I pick up movements others make very slowly, and it doesn't matter if I'm looking at the other dancers or at the teacher in front of me who does in in a mirrord way.

However, watching a pair of dancers doing a dance, I do get what they're doing, and this way I once quickly became a competition dancer in classic and latin.
Yes, several decades plus moons ago. Sigh.

[leftybassman392]

[quote name='Marc S' timestamp='1379273801' post='2210744']
Another question / observation thingy

NB. Bad dancers are said to have "two LEFT feet" - not two right feet!

Marc
[/quote]

Don't even get me started on this one!

Examples of 'Left = Bad':-

Left behind
Left out
Cack-handed (ever stopped to think what that actually means? - clue: it's from Islam)
Sinister (Latin for 'Left');
Devil is Lefthanded
etc., etc., etc.


Examples of 'Right = Good':

in the right
right on
right away
right-thinking
Dexter (Latin for 'Right')
Ambidextrous (Latin for 'On the right both sides' = 'Righthanded both sides')
Jesus is said to sit at God's right hand;
etc., etc., etc.


Upshot; the whole language is thick with stuff like this.


Oh, and I've always been a pretty good dancer......

Edited September 16, 2013 by leftybassman392

[Marc S]

Yes leftybassman,
You could add to that list of right = good
That if someone is said to be a deputy / assistant that you can't do without
they're said to be your "righthand man / woman" .... not your lefthand man / woman

..... so there are some good lefthanded dancers...
ah well, bang goes another theory

[Silvia Bluejay]

Very much the same happens in many other European languages.
The point of my little anecdote about the dance class is that there may be a reason why it's not too easy for a lefty to become a good dancer unless they are really a natural talent. Think of all the rules of traditional dances such as tango, waltz etc. Quite apart from the man having to be the lead - whether he's comfortable with that or not -, most of the standardised movements come more natural if you are right-handed. It's usually the same with any other dance, old or contemporary, for which you have to "learn the moves".

[PaulWarning]

yet left handed sports people seem to have the edge, guess we're better at competition than conforming, nice to know we might not be a bunch of sheep following established procedures, or it could be that right-handers aren't used to playing against lefties as much

[KevB]

Left handed but right footed with me. Most two handed jobs I tend to do right handed, single handed operations (writing, holding a raquet, spoon etc) I do left handed. So it's knife and fork rightie and spoon leftie with me! Can hold a drinks glass with either but as they are usually set up rightie I tend to go with that. Play bass right handed.

[leftybassman392]

[quote name='bluejay' timestamp='1379320962' post='2211114']
Very much the same happens in many other European languages.
The point of my little anecdote about the dance class is that there may be a reason why it's not too easy for a lefty to become a good dancer unless they are really a natural talent. Think of all the rules of traditional dances such as tango, waltz etc. Quite apart from the man having to be the lead - whether he's comfortable with that or not -, most of the standardised movements come more natural if you are right-handed. It's usually the same with any other dance, old or contemporary, for which you have to "learn the moves".
[/quote]

It's a righthander's world, that's for sure (ever tried to put the tone arm down onto a vinyl record with your left hand?).

Actually I'd better stop there or I'll rant on about this all day.

And........................... breathe.......................

[Fat Rich]

I'm pretty relaxed about being left handed in a right handed world, with the exception of scissors. It's easy to make scissors that are comfortable in either hand ( I have a couple of pairs), why limit your market and make them really uncomfortable for left handers? I've seen plenty of right handers swap to their left hand to snip something that's awkward to reach with their right hand.

Oh, and cheque books. Why not bind them across the top so the stub doesn't get in the way of either hand?

[PaulWarning]

[quote name='Fat Rich' timestamp='1379331635' post='2211275']


Oh, and cheque books. Why not bind them across the top so the stub doesn't get in the way of either hand?
[/quote]
My daughter had a Nationwide cheque book with the stub on the right, probably don't do it any more, not many cheques written these days

[BassTractor]

[quote name='PaulWarning' timestamp='1379322191' post='2211135']
it could be that right-handers aren't used to playing against lefties as much
[/quote]

This goes for tennis indeed, and so I assume it goes for similar sports as well.
Added points for the lefty player [b][i]being[/i][/b] used to playing with righties. Yessss!!!

Happily though, I lose all my games, so I'm spared the shame of having won in an unsporty fashion.

[Grangur]

Another lefty here, but look at my avatar. I started off by picking up and playing a bass from a mate and never gave the left/right thing a thought.
Only yesterday I mucked about and tried turned my bass on it's head and tried fretting with my right - no way. I can't do it.

I only wish I had 2 left hands cos I can slap faster with my left. It's not good, but then neither is my right.

[quote name='pietruszka' timestamp='1378987513' post='2207361']
I don't get this knife and fork thing. I thought it was left handed to have the fork in your left hand, but it seems not! When I visit my girlfriend's parents with her, they set the table with the wine glass/glass/cup on the left side for me. I admit it looks very odd against everything being on the right hand side! ....

Dan
[/quote]
The origin of the fork being in the left hand is because you fend off the enemy with the knife in your right hand. Well... some folk do/did. Whatever.

Richard

[Marc S]

[quote name='Grangur' timestamp='1379336884' post='2211386']

...The origin of the fork being in the left hand is because you fend off the enemy with the knife in your right hand. Well... some folk do/did. Whatever.

Richard
[/quote]

Don't think I've ever tried to continue eating, while fending anyone off lol

Some good points here folks
And I really didn't mean to get you wound-up lefty bassman

Was actually thinking about this thread last nite
I tried to play my bass the other way around
It just felt so uncomfortable & un-natural
Bit like dancing to me....

Marc