I'll be handling the COTD for the rest of the week while Jonny and Murilee are out planning mischief I'm sure you're all going to love (Steve Gutenberg better get that restraining order renewed real quick). There was a lot of passion in today's discussion of manual versus automatic that rivals the Kitchen Debate for a passionate defense of a beloved system. Though there was much Nixonian reasoned oratory, it was the Khrushchevian fervor that caught our eye.
Loyal reader Kuang brings the funk and the noise:
"A good manual gearbox brings moments of zen, allowing contemplation whilst sailing atop the ebb and flow of the torque curve.. the infinitesimally minute island of calm as the revs and the road speed cross. One must pause in reverance of the masterpiece of metal and fire at the beck and call of one's right foot before hammering out of the curve sideways, shouting obscenities at the coffin dodger driving the mustard Toyota with the boggy slushbox. No.. automatics are one more wedge driven surruptitiously between us and our cars - an erosion of the biomechanical connection that makes us want to nail every apex, explore the excesses of the redline and extract every last ounce of joy from each drop of fuel. I worship at the altar of the third pedal and shall do so until the last CVT moos off into the great scrapyard on he sky."
Now picture this with a shoe being banged against a United Nations table.