Comments on: Southpaw Tales

By: Hastur

Hastur — Sun, 28 Mar 2010 21:09:37 +0000

I’m a lefty who has always moused right-handed, and only recently realized the big advantage: I can mouse and write at the same time.

I had some tendinitis in my right hand and had to switch for a while. The tendinitis was Tribes-induced, and came down to the fact that I had the button pressed most of the time, due to constant jetpack use. Intermittent pressing never gave me as much trouble.

By: BigDrew

BigDrew — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 21:30:30 +0000

I am also just about exclusively left-handed but I’ve always used mouse with the right hand.

It’s actually amazingly convenient because I can take write and take notes with the left hand while mousing around with the right. (Similarly, being able to do the 10-key pad with the right hand is awesomely convenient because I don’t have to keep stopping to pick up a pencil to write anything down).

But I absolutely can’t use my right fingers on a touchpad without seeming to be extremely disabled. Always break out the left index finger for touch steering.

The only other thing I do right-handed is use scissors…can’t use lefty scissors for the life of me. But I think that has more to do with growing up and having no pairs of left-handed scissors in the elementary school classrooms so had to make-do.

By: shalrath

shalrath — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 18:48:29 +0000

Sorry to revive this ‘ancient’ post, but I somehow managed to be on the Razer email list, and got this linked to me the day after your story.

Coincidence? Who knows.

By: mateus

mateus — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 04:19:49 +0000

I only got it because I’m awesome since birth.

By: M.P.

M.P. — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 18:12:02 +0000

Alec,
I find using a Powerball for half an hour a day helps amazingly with RSI. Was suffering badly from it myself a couple of years back, and buying one helped me no end.
Don’t spin it too fast or for too long though – it’s tempting to try and beat all your friends’ scores, and that’s a sure way to make your wrist worse! :)

By: Jeeva

Jeeva — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 12:52:57 +0000

Heh, yeah. Just saw that on various sites this morning.
10 points for good timing/worrisome coincidence?

By: cowthief skank

cowthief skank — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 07:55:46 +0000

A vertical mouse. I bought one after the pain in my arm started becoming unbearable. Took a couple of hours getting used to and now is almost as good as a normal mouse. They do left-handed ones too.

It was so good that after using it at home for awhile I persuaded my boss, and my boss’ boss, to try it (they both get bad RSI too). After half a day each they convinced my employer to buy us each one.

If you can get over the slight weirdness of control you get used to it within a couple of hours. My boss had a trackball but she said this was so much better.

By: Jaz

Jaz — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 03:42:21 +0000

I got it because everyone’s always telling me that.

By: Swiftasaurus

Swiftasaurus — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 01:03:45 +0000

I got it because of Harry Potter. Sad cringing faces ensue.

By: Will Tomas

Will Tomas — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 00:55:55 +0000

I think I first completed Half-Life using arrow keys and control to fire, rather than the mouse. Crazy. But it was on Easy, and a hold-over from playing the only other FPSes I’d ever played at that point (Dark Forces at home, Wolfenstein and Doom at school) with a keyboard only. Of course, that was over 10 years ago now, but still…

By: Tony M

Tony M — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 00:46:24 +0000

I’m right handed, but I use a mouse left-handed at work, right-handed for gaming. A friend of mine suffered RSI so I spread the load to both hands to reduce the chance I’ll suffer RSI.

Tony

By: Rikard Peterson

Rikard Peterson — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 23:04:50 +0000

I’m right-handed, but I once was starting to feel some mouse-related pain in my hand. I got over it by using pen+tablet. Not for mouselook games, of course, but for everything else, it’s great. (Not to mention that if you’ve ever considered drawing on a computer, a good tablet is very much worth its steep price.)