Since a friend gave Crunk a once over (explaning everything the garage did wrong and what glitches we may still have to contend with), my piece of mind has been somewhat more at rest. At least we now know that he should, in theory, make it all the way out to the sticks and back for Christmas without anything breaking and leaving us stranded on the side of the road.
Newly invigorated, Ben is coaxing me back behind the wheel. He discovered an industrial area where we could practice driving on a quiet circuit and get used to changing gears. A big deserted carpark proved a good place to learn how to get the clutch and accelerator to speak to each other again. Mostly I am fine with changing up, but get a bit flustered changing down - it's trying to do this just before turning into a corner, for example, that makes my brain go "oh ok, that's just way too much to process all at once, so uh, I'll be over here singing early 90s TV themes if you need me. 'Kay? ". Thanks, brain.
Ben probably deserves a medal for stepping into Instructor boots with no prior experience. It is kind of nice to do this in a car that doesn't belong to the driving school, and doesn't have a second set of controls. I can be confident that I am directly responsible for everything the car is doing, and I can experiment in my own time. Yes, I had to stall the car 28 times before I figured out the magical clutch/accelerator combo again, but now I know I can do it. Of course you can take your foot off the break when you leave your other foot on the clutch and want to start moving. That's kind of the whole point. But starting and stopping fluidly is my largest hurdle at the moment and small milestones feel very big.
My curbside parking leaves a lot to be desired, but that's another milestone for another time.
When I got Betty the Beretta 2 1/2 years ago, it had been over a decade since I'd driven a manual shift car. Being someone who was born equipped with five left feet, it was difficult to get said feet to coordinate with each other again. Throw in the right hand, trying to get in there between them with some degree of coordination, and there was a lot of stalling of engines and grinding of gears. "Am I supposed to be in fifth or third? Let's try shifting down. *CRUNNNCCCHHH* Nope, that was reverse." Even now, if I haven't driven for a while I need to give my various appendages a stern talking to because it seems their memories are short. I'm glad Ben can take you out for practice. I'm going to have to do the same with my son this summer. Poor, poor Betty.
ReplyDeleteThanks... so many people have been incredulous when I told them I was learning in a manual. I didn't realise it was such an insane endeavour. Maybe get your boy an automatic?
ReplyDeleteManuals rule!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteMom made me learn a manual (or stick shift as we like to call them in the US of A) back when I learned how to drive in the Stone Ages because she said the first car I would own most likely be a manual (due to them being cheaper). Glad I did, and I actually prefer driving manuals to automatics (although the first time I crawled behind the driver's wheel of a rented manual in Oz, I was struck with the curious dilemma of 'hmm, the stick is now on my left....'. I've since learned I can drive ambidextrously, thankfully.)
ReplyDeletePS - Luv the photo. I feel the rage.
ReplyDelete