On the previous thread I was only asking about Pinkish LED bulbs. Fluorescents have been my bane since my seminary days when the college library's lights emitted an annoying hum that constantly threatened my concentration. We have no trouble with the 60wt equivalent LED bulbs and we even have some of the 3-way sort. Excellent! Try a soft-white and see what you think. :-)
Alan, that is so cool about the fine-tuning such as moving your arm. Does your arm get tired with nothing to rest against? I believe I have always used my other hand to move the paper as needed. Now I wonder where I learned that.
In the Palmer and related handwriting systems the forearm rests on the big muscle just in front of the elbow, on the inside of the arm. The arm moves the hand across the page. Some large letter-forming motions (e.g. large ovals) can be made with the arm alone, holding the hand, fingers and pen in place. The hand should rest on the nails of the fourth and fifth fingers (I'm still working on that). The hand can write maybe a couple of inches without scrunching up the letters, then must be moved. The paper must be moved when the forearm reaches its limit. The fine shaping of the letters is done with the fingers, which can not move very far--maybe several letters. Done properly, the arm, hand and fingers do not tire or hurt. Spencerian handwriting is done with the forearm completely off the table, which is very hard to learn (I am told and reasonably believe). The cross-drill sheets have marks on them at a spacing too far enough apart (3/8 inch) to reach between them with just finger and hand motions. One makes a line of letters, one per mark, across the page, then another line and so forth until the page is full. Then the page is turned 90 degrees and the exercise is repeated. Very definitely 19th-Century, very definitely effective at training the arm muscles. There are also oval, spiral and push-pull drills that train the arm. And now to bed.
Hmmm. I strongly suspect that those particular spacings and positionings would not work so well for me. My hand is rather small, so resting 4th and 5th fingers on the table wouldn't leave me sufficient stretch for writing. Moreover, the sweeping and smooth arm movements you described would not have the same effect for me, being left-handed. This may be why people were switched from left to right. I would rather someone had invented movements for the left hand. I suppose that increasing freedoms gave way to acceptance of many handwriting styles.
OOPS!!!
ReplyDeleteI messed up the scheduling,
but all the while Dean was still First!
Only 7 states have decided to allow Syrian refugees. I am proud to say that Vermont is one of them. :-)
ReplyDeletehttp://www.cnn.com/2015/11/16/world/paris-attacks-syrian-refugees-backlash/index.html
Hooray!
ReplyDeleteOn the previous thread I was only asking about Pinkish LED bulbs. Fluorescents have been my bane since my seminary days when the college library's lights emitted an annoying hum that constantly threatened my concentration. We have no trouble with the 60wt equivalent LED bulbs and we even have some of the 3-way sort. Excellent! Try a soft-white and see what you think. :-)
ReplyDeleteAlan, that is so cool about the fine-tuning such as moving your arm. Does your arm get tired with nothing to rest against? I believe I have always used my other hand to move the paper as needed. Now I wonder where I learned that.
ReplyDeleteIn the Palmer and related handwriting systems the forearm rests on the big muscle just in front of the elbow, on the inside of the arm. The arm moves the hand across the page. Some large letter-forming motions (e.g. large ovals) can be made with the arm alone, holding the hand, fingers and pen in place. The hand should rest on the nails of the fourth and fifth fingers (I'm still working on that). The hand can write maybe a couple of inches without scrunching up the letters, then must be moved. The paper must be moved when the forearm reaches its limit. The fine shaping of the letters is done with the fingers, which can not move very far--maybe several letters. Done properly, the arm, hand and fingers do not tire or hurt. Spencerian handwriting is done with the forearm completely off the table, which is very hard to learn (I am told and reasonably believe). The cross-drill sheets have marks on them at a spacing too far enough apart (3/8 inch) to reach between them with just finger and hand motions. One makes a line of letters, one per mark, across the page, then another line and so forth until the page is full. Then the page is turned 90 degrees and the exercise is repeated. Very definitely 19th-Century, very definitely effective at training the arm muscles. There are also oval, spiral and push-pull drills that train the arm. And now to bed.
Delete--alan
Hmmm. I strongly suspect that those particular spacings and positionings would not work so well for me. My hand is rather small, so resting 4th and 5th fingers on the table wouldn't leave me sufficient stretch for writing. Moreover, the sweeping and smooth arm movements you described would not have the same effect for me, being left-handed. This may be why people were switched from left to right. I would rather someone had invented movements for the left hand. I suppose that increasing freedoms gave way to acceptance of many handwriting styles.
Delete