Left Handers Day [Always on August 13th]

holidayinsights.com ^ | August 13, 2007 | unknown

[Daffynition]

Left Handers Day

When:  Always on August 13th

If you are a Leftie, Then Left Handers Day is just for you!

Left Handers, also commonly referred to as Southpaws, are the brunt of more than their share of jokes all year long. How do I know? Yup, you guessed it! It ain't easy being a leftie. But those of us who are, would have it no other way. Lefties are proud of it.

The world is built for right handers. Examples are everywhere. For example:

• In school, have you ever seen a left handed desk? They don't exist.
• Many left handed items cost more.
• Novelty coffee mugs are made with the picture or text for a right handed pick-up.

• Scissors for for right handers. Only a lefty would understand this.

• The computer mouse you are using as you read this is designed for right handers.

Did you Know? Right handed people operate in the left side of the brain. Left handed people use the right side. Therefore, only left handed people are in their right mind.

Left Hander's certainly earned the right to have a day dedicated to them. And, August 13th is that day. So take a minute to appreciate your left handed friends and loved ones. Don't forget to send them a Left Handed Day Ecard to show your respect.

Remember today and every day: "Lefties have rights!"

Left Handed Facts and Trivia:

• Sinistrophobia is the fear of left-handedness.

• While many people are left handed, very few are 100% left handed. For example, many Left handers golf and bat right handed. On the other hand, there is a high percentage of righties who are 100% right-handed.

• Lefties are also called "southpaws". The term was coined in baseball to describe a left handed pitcher.
• Tuesdays are Lefties luck day.
• Only about 10% of the population is left handed.
• During the 1600's people, thought left handers were witches and warlocks. 

• International Left Hander's Day was first celebrated on August 13, 1976. It was started by Lefthander's International.

• They say everyone was born right handed, and only the greatest overcome it. (he,he,he)
• It is believed that all polar bears are left handed. Also see Polar Bear Day.
• There is a rumor that octopuses have but one right hand. Scientists are diligently studying this issue.

Think about it: Everyone is a Left Hander in Left Hand, West Virginia.

Lefthander's Slogan: "Everyone is born right-handed. Only the greatest overcome it". ...Brilliant Author unknown

[USMCWife6869]

Leftie here!! Left-handed, that is, not politically LOL. I broke my left wrist last year and was pretty much SOL for the 10 weeks in a cast. I can’t do anything with my right hand.

[CounterCounterCulture]

I'm right-handed, but I seem to be disproportionally drawn to left-handers (for example, the first three girls I had the hots for were all left-handed).

There's something about you quirky lefties. ;-)

[alwaysconservative]

Because we have had to learn to approach the world differently and create our own way of doing things, I think we’re more independent as a whole, and more open to quirky and creative approaches.

Just my not-so-humble opinion, LOL!

[Daffynition]

From Left-Handers' Day 2007:

Lefty Brain Teasers

Because their brains are organised differently, left-handers see and think differently and can get some very different results from various "brain tests", usually doing very well on tests that involve creative thinking or unraveling complex images and manipulating 3D images. Here's a famous test of creativity - have a look at the image below:

A non-creative right handed brain sees only a hodgepodge of disconnected shapes, but the left-handed brain can go beyond logic and find the connecting concept that makes sense of the shapes. If you can't "see" beyond the shapes, it's because your right-handed brain is trying to solve the problem and won't let your left-handed brain have a go. If you still can't see the picture, the answer is at the bottom of this page **

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Thurston's hand test

The left-handed brain's mastery of the visual has an important benefit - it can "see" three dimensionally. In Thurston's hand test, you are asked to identify which pictures are of left hands and which are of right hands. Your right-handed brain is at a loss to handle this problem, but your left-handed brain can actually rotate these drawings in imaginary space to solve the test - have a go!

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Kanizsas triangle

Here's another example showing how your left-handed brain can even create things that don't exist. If you can see the white triangle - the one with its apex pointing up - it's because your left-handed brain has created that triangle to unify what is otherwise simply a collection of angles and PacMan shapes. There is, in fact, no white triangle there.

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** The picture in the first brainteaser is of a dog drinking from a stream, with its head in the middle of the picture facing down to the water and its tail off to the right.

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[CounterCounterCulture]

** The picture in the first brainteaser is of a dog drinking from a stream, with its head in the middle of the picture facing down to the water and its tail off to the right.

Nonsense. That's the Vince Foster "suicide" at Fort Marcy Park. I'm wise to your lefty trickery. ;-)

[USMCWife6869]

Wheeeee!! I actually did see that dog drinking.

[CounterCounterCulture]

Now I finally see the damned dog. Took long enough. LOL.

[Mercat]

I’ve heard that lefties have minimal brain disfunction, that their mother had too much testosterone in the brain, and that everyone who is left handed had a twin who died in utero unless the leftie has a surviving twin.

[Mercat]

Lefties likely to die six years earlier than if they were right handed which works for me since my husband is six years older than me and right handed. I’m very left handed and right eyed which means actually that everything is controlled on the right side of my brain.

[Mercat]

When we were in Ireland, my right handed husband and son would not let me drive. I think that they were afraid I would take over the world if I was able to shift with my left hand. hehe.

[Diana in Wisconsin]

What about those of us “Lefties” that have been FORCED to be “Righties” under the ignorant dictatorship of our parents and grandparents who thought it was a crime in the past to be a “Leftie?”

We deserve a day of recognition, too!

I swear I’m a “Leftie.” I do nearly everything left handed (reaching for stuff, dealing cards, buttering my bagel in the morning, picking my nose, etc.) other than writing...and my handwriting is SO bad it’s embarrassing!

Is there no “Day” for me? *SNIF*

[Mercat]

I still don’t know my left from my right hand. I have a mole in my right hand but I still have to check it and if I’m not able to and in a car for example and someone says, turn right, I have to think about it and probably look at my hands before I really know which way to turn.

[Mercat]

I also see the dog but it took me three looks and knowing what to look for. Are there people out there who cannot see it? I definitely see the white triangle and I think I saw most of the hands correctly.

[Mercat]

Please feel free to call yourself a leftie. Anyone who picks his/her nose with the left hand is, by definition, a leftie — no, wait, I use my right hand. ???? what’s with that? But my poor grandmother had a hard time teaching me, her only granddaughter, to sew and knit.

[Diana in Wisconsin]

My MIL is going through the same thing with her ONE Granddaughter (out of 14 kids, total) who is a Lefty. But, they’re both very determined “crafters” so I think all will end well. :)

[Mercat]

My granddaughter is left handed too. And since we’re not biologically related, I consider it simply a gift of God.

[alwaysconservative]

My right-handed mother threw up her hands and refused to teach me to sew or knit because it was all “backwards” to her. So I had to go underground and find my own teachers (LOL!), who all shook their heads at my nonconformist way of doing things, even though they taught me the traditional way. (Nobody has figured out how I do what I do when I knit, for example, and I cannot explain it.)

[alwaysconservative]

Kewl! I got all the hands right, and the white triangle, but it took me awhile to see the dog.

[caseinpoint]

Trouble seeing the dog but the hands and triangles were no problem. Hard-core leftie here. Had troubles learning to back up looking over my right shoulder instead of left, learning to use the right foot for car pedals, learning to do marching drills starting with the right foot, learning to knit and crochet.

I have a wireless mouse because the wire got fatigued from being transferred from left to right of my home computer (I am the only leftie in the family.) I operate a ten-key calculator with my left hand and cuss the number keypad on my keyboard because it’s on the wrong side.

Once while playing softball without a leftie mitt, I chased after a fly to outfield and got so excited I ripped off my mitt while I was running and caught it barehanded. My usual style was to catch a ball, grab it with my right hand, thrust the mitt under my right underarm to rip it off, transfer the ball to my left hand and only then throw it. My softball career was mercifully short ;o)

I also write backwards more easily than forwards. My mind just flips and I don’t have to think about forming the letters backwards. And it is so much easier to write with the fist preceding the letters than dragging behind. I have excellent spatial perception.

Guess I’m just leftie through and through.

[MoochPooch]

Yay! I’m a leftie! (But not politically.)