It's no fun driving a manual shift car in slow moving heavy traffic...If I lived in a city and had to endure the bumper to bumper traffic at a fast crawl everyday, I would have an automatic, it's so much easier....but living in a small town, and being retired, is another story...

Especially larger muscle cars with taller first gears.

Pick-up trucks with their stump-pulling firsts are not so bad in heavy stop & go traffic. Leave a little space and just modulate the following distance with the throttle. Saves the left knee.

Ah, but there's nothing to compare with the winding open of the steam valve and the pulling on the chain of the whistle?

Yeah, a big fast motorcycle is right up there too....

It's fun until you drive in a city with a lot of hills/mountains or better yet, steep roads with lots of traffic. I remember renting a (basic, not a "cool") car in San Francisco in the 80's for business travel and surprise, it had a stick. My co-worker who "knew how to drive a manual" was less adept than he claimed to be and we ended up switching positions for the remainder of the trip. I never understood why Avis had this available in this hilly CA region for use by a bunch of strangers. Possibly to "hone their skills"? It was the only time I received a rental car with a manual in the 35 states that I visited over in a 10 year period. Latin America (AR, BR) is still majority stick shift due primarily to cost versus automatics (this is changing but slowly). Driving on steeper mountainous city/community roads (certain cities in Brazil are interesting to say the least and are especially "exhilarating" when you get followed by someone and then need to stop on a steep incline at an intersection with only sky visible in your windshield and resuming forward travel without rolling back into the person that has tailgated you). As much as I'd like to think I will get a 2 seater with a manual to cruse around in (priors included 64 Vette, 280ZX, Maita, Honda S2000), I'm thinking my knee will not like me.

Well most if not all of the newer manual shift cars now have hydraulic clutches which bear little comparison to the older lever operated clutches which required regular greasing to be reasonably operational...so there's that...still in heavy slow moving traffic the constant jockeying of in gear clutch neutral back in gear just gets frustrating after a while... Being retired I seldom encounter these type situations anymore, so I'm good...

THIS!

I was a big fan of the four on the floor in my youth. I lived in small town Florida with an entire national forest to play in. New roads, no traffic, just the occasional Florida deer. (slightly larger than a great dane but not much) A 1967 Shelby Gt350 with that solid lifter 289 cranking out those mysterious extra ponies the car had. 305hp LOL right. it was labeled the Gt 350 for a reason and it wasn't that Carol liked the number. 305 was for the insurance companies.

THE SOUND!

THE SMELL!

THE FEEL!

Slamming through the gears, winding it out to the red line and then some, Solid lifter cars rev until you hear the lifters start to float, In case you didnt know, on a Shelby modified 'K' series 289 you weren't going to blow the engine in the conventional sense. The bottom was rock solid, but bent valves were a hazard. 8000 rpm was regular territory for these engines with the right gas. (Sunoco 280)

Then I drove in city traffic. That massive clutch (330lb twin disk) required to keep things hooked up gets real heavy in stop and go traffic. My left leg was getting bigger than my right. That night the cramp in my left leg was spectacular. I learned how to drive around cities to get to where I needed to be. Then I stopped trying to drive it as a regular car. It really wasn't intended for urban environment.

My 1987 Shelby CSX was much easier to handle in traffic. it had power steering, brakes, AC. The clutch was still mechanical but the design was much better. Still in stop and go traffic it became tiresome after a while. Especially after long hard days at work. Just not that fun experience. My standard tranny cars became recreational vehicles and an automatic found its way into my garage.

So now I have a Tesla. No gearshift at all. My left foot just sits there, It isn't even needed for the brakes. the cars regenerative braking is such that you rarely use the brake pedal. It accelerates fast than either of the Shelbys, and when carving corners on and autocross course you cant touch it. Even at 4000 pounds and four doors it slips through a course faster than my 1983 Shelby Charger ever did and it was set up for that style of competition.

So I bid a fond fairwell to the days of slamin and jamin and grind em again they'll make em out of rubber next year clutchless driving days and those wonderful left leg cramps.