February, 2006

Know what I hate? I hate it when I misplace an item. Usually, it’s something that I’m using often. I put it down for a second to do something else. But when I want to go and use it again, it disappears. I’ve had this happen all too many times. I’ll search high and low and I can never find it. In the end, the item is usually right there under my nose.

I do a lot of computer repairs so I usually have my tools out lying around. The screwdriver is what I tend to use the most. What usually happens is, I’ll need both hands to do something, so I’ll put the screwdriver down. After I’m done, I’ll go searching around for that screwdriver. After five minutes of looking around, it’s nowhere to be found. And I’m thinking to myself, “I couldn’t have placed it far because I never left the area. So, it’s has to be around here somewhere.” Somehow, the screwdriver manages to hide itself under one of my legs so the whole time that I was searching around, looking for it, I neglect to look in the area that is closest to me. The thing is, I don’t remember putting it so close.

Recently, Ricky lent me his iPod Shuffle because he has some Chinese songs on there. I wanted to grab a few off him so he just handed over his iPod and I can transfer the songs over when I find one that I like. I’ve had that iPod for about a week now but recently I’ve seen to have misplaced that too. I searched every single jacket that I’ve worn for the past week and none of them seem to hiding an iPod. Most of those jackets are dark coloured jackets so spotting a white iPod should be easy, even with my bad eye sight.

I thoroughly checked all my winter coats but none of them had an iPod in it. I decided to check my sprint jacket and presto, the iPod was in the pocket of that jacket. It didn’t occur to me at the time to check the spring jacket. Who in their right mind would wear a light sprint jacket in the middle of winter? Apparently, I did. It dawned on me that I had worn that jacket when the weather was on the plus side but the next day, it became cold again, so I grabbed the winter jackets again. On the bright side, I don’t have to pay Ricky any money.

I’ve also misplaced my wallet a few times. Luckily, it was misplaced at home and not some public area. Usually, I keep my wallet either in my back pant pocket or in my left jacket pocket. One day I had to take the bus to work so I grabbed my jacket and my bag and started walking to the bus station. A few blocks from the bus station, I started thinking about the price of a bus ticket. I reached into my pant pocket to check and see if I had enough money but the wallet wasn’t there. I checked my left jacket pocket but it wasn’t there either. I checked every single pocket on me and still nothing. I started to worry and hoped that I had left it at home because once in a while that happens.

So, I rushed back home to find my wallet because I have to buy a ticket to get to work. I get home and I search everywhere for my wallet. It was nowhere on my desk or my bed or my bookshelf. I was starting to worry and thought maybe I dropped it somewhere. Then something clicked in my head. There I was, sitting at my desk, staring at my bag. I can see a bulge on the front flap that resembled the shape of my wallet. I unzipped the front pocket and sure enough, low and behold, there was my wallet. I can tell you now, that I said a four letter word a lot when I saw the wallet.

I don’t know why I keep doing this but every now and then I get some sort of memory lapse. That very minor detail that I need to know was temporarily forgotten. It is as if I have Alzheimer’s or something. I think that the more I age, the less I remember. I don’t even remember writing this blog! So, if you see me walking down the street and it looks as if I don’t know you, wait a few seconds to allow time for my brain to process the information before approaching me.

Being left handed doesn’t have that much advantage over being right handed. Growing up in a right handed society, I had to do things using right handed items. Because of that, I’ve learned to use both my right and left hand, meanwhile exercising both side of my brain.

Right handed people are dominated by their left brain which means they should be good with languages, logic and math. This side handles input one at a time and processes information in linear and sequential manner. The other side of the brain is dominant for things such as spatial abilities, face recognition, visual imagery and music. Rather than processing information one at a time, the left lobe integrates many information at once and processes them simultaneously. That explains why I’m so good at multitasking.

Let’s try a little test. If you’re right handed, take a look at the image below and see if you can make out what the picture is supposed to be.

You may see a bunch of disconnected shapes. A left handed person goes beyond logic and find the connecting concept that makes sense of the shapes. Right handed people have a bit of a hard time trying to solve the problem but they won’t let the other side of the brain attempt to solve the problem. What you should see is a picture of a dog with its head in the middle of the image and the tail towards the outer edge.

Growing up in this society, I’ve learned to do things with both hands. I’m the only one in my family who is left handed so genetics had nothing to do with it. Not wanting to be left out (no pun intended) I tried fitting in by using my right hand. It took me a while to get use to writing with the right hand, but I think I’m doing a pretty good job at it. Being left handed allows me to do things that a right handed person would have trouble doing. When you read a book, you read from then left to the right. I don’t know how, but I have very little trouble reading right to left. Try it out:

No problem reading that, right? Now try it the other way.

Not as easy as you may think, huh?

In this right handed dominant society, there’s not much out there for a lefty. If it appears that I am clumsy at times, it’s because I’m walking in a world design for right handed people. Although I’m a lefty, I do perform some tasks with my right hand. I’ll take a drink of water using my right hand. I’ll cut a piece of paper using right handed scissors. When I go bowling, I’ll bowl with my right hand. When I play cards, I’m using right handed cards. Did you know that? In order for me to properly hold those cards with my left hand, the numbers have to be on the opposite side.

Have you ever try sitting down next to a left handed person at the dinner table? That’s a bit of an annoyance because I usually end up having a little elbow war with the person sitting next to me. In order to prevent this from happening, I’m usually stuck all by myself at the end of the table.

Did you know that the left hand does the typing fifty six percent of time? In this paragraph, the left hand typed 82 characters while the right hand typed 56 characters.

Although, there are no direct correlations between the dominant side of the brain and the hand you use most often, I’m pretty sure that left handed people are smarter than right handed people. It is a proven fact that the one side of the brain controls the opposite side of the body. So in a sense, left handed people are the only ones in their right mind. Ha ha!

We are more imaginative and more motivated. We are a rare group living in a right handed dominant world. We are able to use right handed products better than right handed people using a left handed products. About 10% of the world’s population consists of left handed people. There a lot of famous people who are left handed. Jay Leno, Julia Roberts, Keanu Reeves, Paul McCartney, Henry Ford, Mark Twain, H.G. Wells, Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci. Heck, even Bart Simpson is left handed. To be added to the list of Famous Left Handers…. Don Khuth!

Let’s say that you were in a situation where you were walking around, minding your own business when you encounter someone doing something illegal. Would you pretend as if you didn’t see anything or would you do something about it? What if you saw someone that in some sort of trouble. Would you help them out or would you ignore the situation.

I was walking to the bus terminal today and because it was so bloody cold out, I cut through Jackson Square. I was walking aimlessly around, trying to warm up from the cold, when I saw a man walk away from a store. I’m still half a sleep so I didn’t notice it much at first but the more I thought about it, the more that it seemed as if he had just stole from the store. I didn’t have my glasses on so I didn’t get a good view of the situation.

There was another girl walking from the hallway to the right. From her view, she was looking straight at the area where the man was. After I caught a glimpse of the event, I looked over at her and by the expression on her face, I think the man did commit a crime. I looked back at the store and noticed that the cashier was clueless about the whole thing?

The man looked like a homeless person. He had a toque on his head, his coat and pants were dirty and his beard unshaven. In a situtation like this, what can you do? It’s not your responsibility to keep watch of the store. It’s not your job to make sure everything is fine. If you had reported on the man, there no idea what he’ll do to do after. There’s a lot of things running through your head at the time. By the time you come to a logical conclusion on the situation, the time has passed to do anything about it.

What about this scenario? You are walking around when you see someone in need of assistance. Let’s say they couldn’t breathe and needed CPR. You are not trained in CPR but you’ve seen it done on Baywatch enough times that you believe you can perform it yourself. The person collapse so you dial 911 and call for an ambulance. In the meantime, you try to esuscitate the person so you start CPR on them. After a few attempts, you successfully revive the person. When the person is awaken, they are in pain. The ambulance arrives and takes that person to the hospital. You walk away, feeling good about yourself because you had just help save a life.

Later on in the week, you get a subpena, summoning you to court regarding the person whose life you had saved. Turns out, when you performed CPR on them, you broke a few ribs and they are now suing you for that. It makes you wonder how someone can do that to you after you had saved their life. Makes it seemed as if that person would before to lose their life than break their ribs.

In this situation, given the circumstances, you would have probably acted on impulse and did what you believed to be the best thing at the time. When you act on impulse, you don’t have time to weigh the odds. You do what you can and hope that it’s enough. The Good Summaritan Law protects people from situations like this.

These days, a lot of people are getting lazy and they won’t do anything if it doesn’t concern them. They don’t want to help out unless it benefits them in some way. They don’t want to do any favours for you unless they get something in return. What happened to the old days where people were more willing to help each other without asking for anything in return?