Shift

Dear log, how are you? I am troubled. I had planned on another
Starbucks visit, and it went ahead, but with poor results. Today Kiana
and I woke and did some chores, and I used her internet briefly, but
the main plan was to go to Carmel, drop me at Starbucks for several
hours, let my torrents finish (Tokyo Drift), and then spend the
evening doing something. We drove from atop the mountain to a "gas
station", and from there Kiana let me drive to Carmel. It was a "stick
shift", and she was scared of a hill start.

We met Charlie, and then about a million of her school friends, and
ate at this Lebanese restaurant (I had a sole falafel), and then went
to Starbucks. Sadly they wanted to go to the warf, and my computer was
shut down mere moment after powering on. It wasn't all bad, her
friends are quite cool and friendly to talk to. We went to the moonlit
beach again and they had fun with fire and running around. I got to
know some of her friends better, and I generally had a good night.

Then Kiana let me drive all the way back to her house, which is about
an hour. It included unlit sharp turns and a long, steep and
unmaintained dirt road. They are so much fun. I felt silly driving a
4x4 pickup on paved roads, but it really feels proper when you're on
dirt. It's just more natural to drive those things on there to me. We
just arrived back, and I have written this on my phone using Pocket
Word. I think we shall sleep now. I will post this tomorrow via some
kind of data transfer from here to laptop to iMac to GMail to Blogger.
Wish this post luck.

---

Well, if you're reading it, then the post made it. I wrote that last
night after we returned, and now I am back on Kiana's Mac I can write
a little bit more about how nice it was to drive again. Kiana's still
learning how to use a manual gearbox, and she's going through the
phase of letting the clutch out without slipping, and theremore there
is much stalling. The truck has a large flywheel, and so when she does
stall it's particularly violent. I was surprised at how quickly I
adjusted to it though, and I feel I can drive most cars without too
much worry now. I changed to second instead of fourth once, but I
needed to accelerate anyway. I also stalled on the way up on the dirt
road, but it was a shocking part with very steep gradients and a sharp
turn. Hopefully she'll let me drive again. Maybe on the road trip. You
can't go fast in that thing though, I wasn't going much over 50 the
whole time, and occasionally doing 60.

I don't have much to add, other than I really need to go to Starbucks
for a slightly more extended period next time. Oh, and Erin, don't do
that thing we were saying we were going to do unless I get the chance
to do what I said I would do at the place I said I'd do it, a little
later than the time we said we'd do it.

I will now reply to Natasha's lovely email.