Rain rain go away

It rained overnight in St. George. Normally, I love rain. It makes things cooler and cleaner. It sounds nice. It can be fun to watch. But this morning, I was laying in bed at about 5am listening to the rain and wishing it would stop. Why? Because it's watering the weeds!

We've spent a lot of time in the last 2 weeks trying to get rid of weeds. They're everywhere. They grow so fast. We've been ripping them out, whacking them, mowing them, spraying them and just about anything else we can think of. And now they just got another batch of water over night. They'll be 4 feet tall again by tomorrow. Grrrr.

P.S. You really don't need to use P.S. anymore

I tend to write in a very conversational style, which can be difficult and confusing at times. And when I write emails, I commonly put things in after my "signature" as a post script. We're all familiar with "P.S." and it's usage. It really comes from the Latin "post scriptum" meaning "written after" which you probably could have guessed if you didn't already know. But, if you think about it, the internet age has eliminated the need for post scripts.

If you were writing someone a letter a zillion years ago, or even typing someone a letter a few decades ago, you could easily conclude your letter, sign it, and then remember one more tidbit that you wanted to include. The only logical way to do it was with a p.s. at the end. No one wants to re-write a whole page just to insert a small paragraph. But these days, who writes? In the amount of time it takes to type "p.s." you could scroll up into the body of your letter/email and put your additional comments in the body of your text and no one need know that you only added it at the end. And yet, I still use it. Many others undoubtedly use it as well.

But, I suppose it's a good thing, because if we ever quit using it all together, our children or grandchildren would read some old book (Austen's characters always seem to be writing letters to each other) and encounter a mysterious "p.s." at the end of a letter and end up all confused.

Handed items

Handedness has been an interest of mine for many years. The majority of people are right-handed. I am left-handed. Neither of these things are anybody's fault. Likewise, no one is to blame for the fact that a great many objects are right-handed. In some cases, poor design leaves things very awkward to use for a lefty, when some better engineering could yield a more ambidextrous item. A computer mouse, for example, can be designed to be symmetrical allowing for use with either hand. Or, it can be very "form fitting". That fancy right-handed mouse is ok if you're going to use it in your own home, but please don't stock a whole computer lab with right-handed mice! (Note: I use a mouse with my right hand, as a majority of lefties do. This is because most of us don't want to have to rearrange every computer we ever sit at. Additionally, the most common windows shortcuts are left handed (select all, cut, copy, paste, save), so using the mouse with your right hand can speed up many processes. (What about on a Mac? Seems like that funky "apple" button is on the left.)

Other times, there is simply no way around it. There are many things that fall into this category, like screws. Yes folks, screws are right-handed. In general, putting a screw into something (a wood board, for instance) is harder than taking it out. Putting a screw in means twisting to the right, which for a righty means twisting your arm "out" (Shannon would know the technical term for this direction of twisting). Twisting in this direction is a much more powerful move than twisting "in". Try it. Even if you're just turning an imaginary screw driver. Twisting "in" makes your elbow poke out weird, and anything that makes your elbow poke out weird is probably not a very strong move. For lefties though, we're forced to drive screws with that awkward elbow poke. We're much better at taking screws out. That's where our power lies. But, a screw has to be either right handed or left handed. It just wouldn't work otherwise. So it might as well benefit the greatest number of people. (For the engineers out there: can you design an ambidextrous screw?)

I'm always on the lookout for items that are handed (either right or left). And they crop up in places that you wouldn't expect. The one I've discovered (or maybe just been reminded of) lately is zippers. About 2 months ago, my right thumb nail underwent some unknown trauma. I really have no idea what happened to it, but it seems to have died and then restarted. So, for the last few weeks, I've had tattered ends of half a nail on my right thumb. It's a bit tender, and I notice when I have to use it. And zippers on pants are all right handed. BUT, all this time in the bathroom thinking about handedness has made me realize that toilets are generally LEFT handed. Apparently people don't want to zip up their pants with the same hand they just flushed with.