J.W. Burleson photo / Boquillas del Carmen, Coah.

PHB

My photo
Brooklin, Maine, United States
We own a 1975 GMC Sierra Grande 15 in Maine and a 1986 Chevrolet Custom Deluxe 10 in West Texas. Also a pair of 1997 Volvo 850 wagons. Average age in the fleet is 28 years--we're recycling. I've published 3 novels: THE LAW OF DREAMS (2006), THE O'BRIENS (2012), and CARRY ME (2016). Also 2 short story collections: NIGHT DRIVING(1987) and TRAVELLING LIGHT (2013). More of my literary life is at www.peterbehrens.org I was a Fellow at the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study for 2012-13. I'm an adjunct professor at Colorado College and in the MFA program at Queens University of Charlotte. In 2015-16 I was a Fellow at Harvard University's Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. The Autoliterate office is in Car Talk Plaza in Harvard Square, 2 floors above Dewey Cheatem & Howe. SUBSCRIBE TO THE AUTOLITERATE DAILY EMAIL by hitting the button to the right.

Wednesday, August 19, 2015

Three on the tree: manual vs automatic

 short throw
3 on the tree

"Last August, I flew from Philadelphia to Ft Worth to buy my dream car: a 2002 Jeep Wrangler. TJ model, soft top, cherry red, no rust and, of course, a manual transmission.
"Of course” is, in part, tradition. Is a Wrangler really a Wrangler if it’s an automatic? No, not really – and I felt that way even though I had never driven a car with a manual transmission before. I wanted to become a member of this shrinking club: that of the stick shift driver..."


---Thanks to Lee Saloutos for the heads-up on this piece from The Guardian on manual vs. automatic transmissions. I may have the only Volvo 850 station wagon in America with a manual trans. It's the only one I've seen, anyway, in 18 years. Always loved shifting gears. Used to dream about it when I was a kid.  Didn't have to be a stick shift either. Three on the tree, fine by me. 

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