The Raptor is an Automatic. Thank God.

TechPapa recently got a new truck.

There is no word for this truck other than badass.  I mean, seriously.  People see this beast coming at them in their mirrors and they MOVE.  Like, they HAUL TAIL to get out of the way.

This is a big change from what TechPapa was driving: A lightning blue John Cooper Works Mini Cooper Clubman.

There are two explanations for this:  a) He has lost his mind or b) Mid-life crisis.  Okay, maybe three.  Add c) He’s always wanted a truck.  It’s probably a combination of the three, but in the end, this transition from Mini to Raptor he gained 118.5 total inches of car.  That’s, what, right around 10 feet of CAR??  Seriously?

Now, I love the truck.  I ADORE the truck.  I saw it on the lot while he was out of town just after they’d taken it off of the hauler.  “DO NOT TOUCH IT!” was his text to me when I teased him with a picture.  My reply?  “I don’t want to touch it.  I want to lick it.”  As I’ve said.  Bad. Ass.  {melt}

The Mini was fun, though.  And forbidden fruit.  He had it for 5 years during which time he let me drive it ONCE.

See, I have a confession to make.  I can’t drive stick.  I never learned.  Never needed to.  Closest I ever came was in New Zealand in 2001 when The Kiwi and I were traveling the North Island, but I shelled out the extra moolah for an automatic.  Driving on the wrong side of the road was challenge enough.  I didn’t need another pedal and a gear shift to boot.  So when TechPapa got the Mini which was a 5-gear manual, I was simply stranded at home whenever he decided, for whatever reason, like it might rain (Heaven FORBID the Mini get WET), to drive my car.

There was one time, a couple of years ago, when he took me to some random industrial parking lot and tried to teach me to drive it.  Let’s just say that was NOT a banner day in our marriage.

So imagine my surprise when the other day while he was at work, I got a text:  “Go take the Mini for a spin.  She leaves tonight.”

Seriously?  The car is all but SOLD and NOW he wants me to go try to drive it?  WITHOUT HIM?

Heh.  Awesome.

I called my mother and told her I was on my way to get her IN THE MINI.  Somehow, in the 5 years, she had never even RIDDEN in the thing, so if I was going to drive it, dadgummit, she was going to ride shotgun.  Besides, she only lives a half a mile down the road.  Plus, she knows how to drive stick, so if I got in trouble, I knew she’d have my back.

I only stalled twice backing out of the garage.  I coasted through the first stop sign going slighly slower than I would have been going if someone was pushing the car.  I stalled once at the second stop sign where I had completely stopped to wave four cars past and wondered momentarily why there was a traffic jam in the ‘hood just when I needed the roads to be clear.  Managed to make it through that stop sign, and just as I was getting all confident in myself (HA!), I got stuck at the third stop sign.  In front of a friend’s house.  Who knows how to drive stick.  And who would never let me live it down if she’d spotted me.  No matter how hard I tried, I could NOT get away from that stop sign without stalling.

After several minutes of praying and REALLY trying not to Lose My Everyloving Cool and waving another 8 cars through the intersection around me (there are NEVER that many cars out here, I swear!) I tucked tail and called my mom.  “Um, Mom?  Can you come get me?  I’m stuck.”

She calmly talked me through the lift-off-the-clutch-while-you-press-the-accelerator-and-reclutch-through-the-kicks rigamarole, and I nearly cried when I finally started rolling.  Very very slowly, and never getting out of first gear (so, you know, turtles were passing me), I drove toward her house to pick her up.

For the next half hour, we drove around the neighborhood, TechPapa’s stated limits, laughing until our sides hurt at my efforts, however fruitless, to actually come to a stop then GO again without stalling.  He had turned the A/C off for whatever reason, I was too caught up trying not to kill this sold car to try to turn it on, and Mom was absolutely clueless where to even start (the Mini’s controls were always a bit of an enigma to me), so we rolled down the windows and let the neighborhood hear our raucous laughter.  And my occasional swearing.

Finally, we drove down the alley to our garage and I looked at our driveway just off to the left.  Slight slope up with my rental car (oh, that’s a whole other blog post) parked on one side.  I paused.  Mom and I both sighed.  “Well,” she finally said.  “Here’s your chance to total two cars you don’t own at once.  Go for it.”

I cackled, she covered her eyes, and I eased off the clutch as I pressed the accelerator.  Without a hiccup, I started rolling, gave it a little gas, and eased up the slope.

At which point the car promptly stalled.

“DONE!” I proclaimed, yanked up the emergency brake, and called TechPapa.  “Okay, I drove it.  It’s in the driveway.  If you want it in the garage, come move it yourself.”

“So you drove it!  How was it?”

“Oh, it was fun!” I admitted.  “But ask mom how I did next time you talk to her.”

“Why?  That bad?”

“Well,” I wiped the sweat from my brow as I opened the back door of the house. “Let’s put it this way.  She’s walking home for a glass of wine.”

“But it’s 11:30 in the morning.”

“Exactly.”