having to watch the tabs slide from side to side was so annoying, i just wanted to press M or I or C to get what I needed to see instantly.
it wasn't as bad in Fallout3, but still inferior to other games were you can access any of this info much faster. (On PC atleast)
F4 would bring up the journal, then if you had set it to local or world map before hand that page would pop up automatically.
However yes you're right it was a bit fiddly at times.
A M for world map and L for local would work ( or any other keys. )
The Pc is said to be getting a seperate UI for Skyrim so maybe better key bindings are standard.. fingers crossed.