> I will always remember my first driving lesson. My dad and I were in our van in the parking lot behind the library. I got in the driver's seat, and after I got the engine running my dad told me to leave it in park. He then explained how you don't need to press the gas pedal very much at all to get acceleration. After that, he told me to hit the gas (with the car still in park).
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> Me: *press gas pedal lightly -- or what I think is lightly*
> Engine: VROOOOOOOOM!
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> I jumped, I think. And I learned really quickly how lightly you _really_ have to press the gas. I'm just glad that Dad told me to keep the car in park... if I'd hit the gas like that with the car in gear and I then had to steer I'd probably have been so surprised that we'd have hit something.
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> ~Chrysanthemum~

What a difference a half century makes! When I started learning to drive, the car was a worn-out, 12-year-old Ford with a 60 horsepower engine. It knocked and smoked a lot. To get it moving, it was necessary to floor the gas pedal and then ever-so-slowly, let the clutch pedal out. After a while, it would begin to creep forward. If the clutch came out too fast it would make a little bump and the engine would stop. But that was the summer of 1949.
Howard