Handwriting and subjectivity, and its form over the day

Same here. Why does the handwriting
change over the day? From neat uncial
to a scrawl, to just readable and sweeping
Pitman lines.
Are our motor skills in that way affected
by so much key-pressing?

X-URL: http://memex.naughtons.org/archives/2006/10/29/3373
Memex 1.1 John Naughton's online diary
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Handwriting and subjectivity

I've had some interesting conversations recently with friends and
colleagues about handwriting. I'm perpetually annoyed and puzzled by
my own. Some days it seems legible and orderly, but usually I find it
intensely irritating. And I wonder why it varies so much from day to
day. Is it to do with mood, or hassle or tiredness? Or something else?
In many cases (e.g. the pages of my notebook shown in the photograph)
my scribbling seems -- to me -- to be illegible and hopelessly untidy.
Other people's handwriting, in contrast, always seems to me to be
orderly and consistent -- even when it's illegible. But then I
discover -- from talking to them -- that they think my handwriting is
neat, orderly, legible and consistent, which it manifestly is not! So
is it the case that other people's handwriting always seems better
than one's own?

Another interesting observation. I spend a lot of my working day with
techies. Yet -- with only two exceptions -- they all carry and use
paper notebooks. (The two exceptions carry and make notes on tablet
PCs.) It's clear that the paper notebook has a lot of life left in it
yet.
....