It's shameful to admit, but I'm one of those people who can't drive stick.  Manual transmission vehicles have scared the hell out of me for most of my driving life.  I've avoided them like the plague - that is until a couple of years ago when my girlfriend decided to teach me.  It was embarrassing, but we spent many a night in a large, empty parking lot just practicing to get the feel for it.  Now, it would be good to note that driving in general is pretty easy for me.  At the point where I started to learn how to drive stick, I had been driving automatics for about 10 years.

I ended that learning campaign on a high note, with a complete trek across town.  If memory serves me, I only stalled it once on that trip.  For some reason which is failing my memory now, I gave up driving the standard car after that trip.  Fast forward a couple of years to today.  I recently replaced my Saturn Ion with a new Chevy Colorado pickup truck.  Still automatic, but much more fun!  The problem is that I bought it right as gas prices started to go through the roof.  Well, we still have our manual Saturn, so it became obvious that we could save some fuel costs by carpooling and taking the Saturn to work.  The only problem is that the logistics require me to drop my spouse off first, then continue on to work.  Eek!

So, I decided that tonight was the night and I once again got behind the wheel.  It took me a good half hour to remember everything and I asked a great number of questions.  In the end, I drove around town and down some back roads where I only stalled a handful of times.  I also managed to make the car jerk forward and back quite heavily a couple of times.  My biggest challenge is first gear.  Everything else is relatively easy.  After sever attempts at starting from the stop position, I discovered that it's mostly about giving a little gas, then slowly letting off of the clutch.  Real slow.  It's a good thing I didn't stop on any hills, I probably would have rolled into somebody.  I guess that is what I will work on next!