POLL: Can you drive stick?

When I was 16 my friend's father (who was a meat wholesaler) got sick and I was the only friend of his son with a drivers license so he asked me if I could do his deliveries for him that day.

He had a white panel truck. I had to drive to the slaughterhouse and pick up some carcasess and deliver them to various restaurants.

It was a rainy fall day, the passenger windshield wiper wasn't working (we drove with the passenger window open with him wiping the side of the window from time to time so I could see out that side) and I had never driven stick before.

By time we finished the deliveries I could drive stick.

I have never owned an automatic.

My second car was a "70 Mustang with a manual transmission, so it taught me drive a stick. The real challenge was my third car, a '72 MG Midget. It had a non-synchro first gear that taught me to "double clutch". I think that over my whole driving experience, it is about 50/50 manuals/autos. My GTI has a DSG, which is great, though once in a while I yearn for a manual. Have I staked out the middle ground yet???

Learned to drive stick on a 2012 boss 302 and a 1999 svt cobra and became fluent with it after taking a trip to my uncles up in new york and driving his 01 m5 around next car will be a manual tranny haha

Learned on a 2000 ford ranger back in 05 been driving,a,stick,ever since. They are just so much more fun, you can imo feel the car better, sync,if you will

First drove stick at 12, now 24. The GTI is my 6th car, all but 1 have been manuals. I know DSG is technologically superior, but I enjoy the connection with the car. It's nice to feel what gear the car is in, hear the revs, and know how fast I'm going.

I'm going to regret getting a 6spd as I go through getting 2 torn rotator cuffs repaired next year. The only auto car I have access to is my mom's 3 door yaris. It is an aggressively horrible little shitbox, and going through the recovery time driving it is going to SUCK!

Here in the UK if you don't pass your test with manual transmission then you aren't licensed to drive them. As most of our cars are manual, pretty much all of us can drive them.

The better questions to weed out the dedicated drivers over here would be things like "can you heel and toe?", "can you double declutch properly in a car with no synchromesh?" or "can you change gear smoothly without using the clutch?" (Hire cars are best used for practising the last of those, but it's a useful skill to have in the bag just in case)