Seems like there is some history to it, unique to Southern California:

Why is this a thing in California? I don’t quite understand it. My girlfriend is living in California now so every time she comes back to NJ, she calls every highway “the”. So it always sounds so foreign to me.

I think you are doing something wrong still lol.

I wish they actually enforced this. This is the most infuriating thing about driving with other people on the road. I dislike passing on the right since it is certainly dangerous but it’s a better solution than tailgating and/or flashing high beams. Some people just seem so oblivious to the idea of keep right, pass…

I think I am confused how mileage costs money

The thing is though that without the manual transmission, there are really no physical skills involved at all with driving. Especially due to power steering, traction/stability controls, power everything. So it becomes 100% mental to learn how to drive an automatic. Whereas driving a manual is a more coordinated…

Clearly the solution is you need to drive $4000 worth of additional mileage from now until you have to give it back. Since they decided it doesnt matter how much you actually drive, but only the time used, you should add an extra 200k miles to the car. Think of how many places you could drive!!

See the problem is driving is necessary in order to live in most places in the US. Basically, if you cant drive you cant work (or go to school for some people) and not everyone’s parents can shuttle their kids around. So the requirements to be “legal” are so tame that you definitely do not need to know how to actually…

While I think this would have been awesome, that would have been scary as hell. Getting the hang of driving in general was at least tough in the beginning. Being aware of everything going on around me and being in control of a 2ton death machine. I felt a similar experience again when learning to drive manual on my…

Definitely try to drive both though. I imagine that will only solidify your opinion one way or the other. The ND is quite the nice car for sure. Although I kinda enjoyed the FRS more except for the no-convertible thing.

How is this not a nightmare at the DMV to deal with? I imagine they dont have an actual process written for trading cars and it is treated as buying a car for $0 and selling a car for $0. Wouldnt that cause all sorts of problems for taxes? I would imagine the only real way to solve it is to both go to the DMV at the…

I disagree. Because of the auto-flush, it always ends up flushing right when I get up to wipe. And then I have to go and press the button to flush it a second time anyways. Not only does it waste more water, but then I have to touch the button, which defeats the purpose. With a lever, I can use my foot to flush it…

Automatic toilets are the worst. Why is it so hard to find a manual toilet anymore? Sure an auto might be nice when there are a ton of others crowding up the bathroom and you just need to get your business done. But I know I can manual flush faster and more efficiently than those new damn autos. You just are more part…

Solid choice. What about the manual won you over?

I really wish I got into crappy cars earlier. I always had no money through all of high school and college, so just having a dependable economy car was the only solution in my mind. But looking back, I was always down to learn how to wrench on anything. And I totally could have had any number of sub $1000 cars to play…

I have driven (for a short distance) both the automatic and manual ND. This was at the Mazda experience thing (or whatever it was called) where you get to take the new Miata through three courses (braking, slalom, easy autocross). For the first two (braking and slalom) you use an automatic. As far as automatics go,…

Certainly agreed! Jack stands and wheel under the car. Even during wheel swaps, I roll the wheel under the car because you can never be too safe.

For swapping wheels, I never use a jack stand. I have to raise my car much higher to get the jack stand in place than just to get the wheel off. I generally figure that the floor jack raising the car a couple inches off the ground is very unlikely to fail. Whereas extending the jack 3/4 full extension to get the jack…

This is why I always just drive around with a floor jack in my trunk. Damn scissor jack doesnt even go near my car. And I drive a Miata so obviously anyone else has plenty of room to carry one around. Sure floor jacks can fail and a jack stand is always ideal for actual work under the car. But it is a ton safer for…

Exactly, I usually get smoked off the line by many Prius.