Wow-Pen Optical Mouse Joy

The shame!  We've been avoiding this moment for weeks: we've left the Wow-Pen Optical Mouse Joy sit around without testing it for a while now.  But what were we complaining about?  The name says it all: this is a mouse that should fill us with joy.

That said, we really weren't very optimistic about its strange oblique shape and the buttons at the bottom underneath the thumb.  So we found all sorts of excuses: 'I've only got one USB port left, or two maybe ... but I always keep one spare just in case' or 'my desk is too cluttered, I'd never be able to try it out' or even 'I just don't have the time.'

But the time has come: let's give it a go.  The first good point is that your palm doesn't touch the surface of your desk, but instead remains on the mouse.  That's good for your carpal tunnel.  It's less fun for your fingers, though, as it's hard to know where to put them (see inset).  You need to completely re-learn how to use this mouse.  It's almost as if you turned your computer screen through 90°, but didn't move your head.

We lasted ... six hours

Honestly, we stuck it out as long as we could, and we even unplugged our usual desktop mice (a Logitech G5 and a SteelSeries Sidewinder Laser) so we weren't tempted to use them.  We had to, in the end, because without even realising, we found our hands reaching out for the Sidewinder.

But it was too much.  After six hours of struggling, after taking much longer than we normally would to edit photos, getting thrashed in games and plenty of other frustrating little details in just about every app, we returned to our faithful friends.  Not all change is for the best ...

PS: to make things worse, this mouse isn't very easy to get hold of online.  If, despite our advice, you still want to get your hands on one, you can try looking on Amazon ...