Driving Scariness...

I've already warned DH how so worth it that it will be (getting my licence) because I'll be able to shop so much more!  Places that are awkward to get to right now on public transport!  And with a car to carry more bags!  I think he's scared. 

  Just think of all the hours I can spend just wandering around the grocery store alone, finally getting to check everything out and see what it is without DH frantically throwing things in the trolley and trying to rush us out of there. I am thankful, though, because sometimes when there is a huge crowd, it's nice to have someone to keep me from feeling claustrophobic and lost in the store. 

Yes, it would be sooo nice, just to be able to hop in the car and drive to the shops, however, most of the shops are in Alnwick, which seems like the freakiest place to drive ever, IMO. The roads there are even narrower, more crowded, and scarier than here! In fact, I should take lessons there, just because I know if I can drive around there without issues, then it would seem pretty easy to drive around most of the other villages. And in Newcastle? Not sure I will be ready for that for quite a long while!

I didn't learn to drive for 5 years, and when I did it changed my life! My advice to you is pick yourself up, and get back in that car. Keep driving, experience is the only way to get comfortable doing it. My life has completely changed since learning to drive, I can pop in the car and do anything I want, whenever I want, more career options. I say, in the nicest way possible, pull yourself together and get driving! Good luck!
 

Heck yeah! I definitely want to feel like you do now! I am going to keep driving (with DH in the car for a while), and hopefully take some lessons soon. I just want to get it over with and not feel this anxiety anymore.

All the years I was in the UK I was too terrified to even think about going for the driving test.  Partly because I had never owned a car in the US or even done much driving after I got the license in high school (always lived near a bus)  But I finally told myself I was going to do some lessons (on an automatic) and that was all.  Not going to think about the test.  I was facing having to come back and care for my parents and figured I could use a brush up anyway.  So my first lesson I thought he would just take me around the side roads of Headingley.  But no!!  He told me to go and turn onto the Otley Road!!  What do I do but start to turn into the wrong side of the road!!!  After all the years I'd lived there and "knew" about driving on the opposite side, I still instinctively went with my earlier training.  Gack!  That's what is scary for us TransAtlantic types.
Anyway, he eventually got me driving on the main roads, roundabouts and even the A1 down to Wakefield and back (that was easy!)  So I probably could have gone for the test.  I figure make it easy for yourself and do the automatic.  Then once you've got that you can always do the manual.

Yes - this!  Plus, I'm used to pressing down the clutch & easing down the brake simultaneously when slowing & knowing I'll be shifting gears - and my instructor was saying - no, you've got to start braking first (clutch up) then press the clutch a bit later...keep your hands on the wheel - don't reach for the stick until the last possible moment...arrrrrrrgggggggh!  It's totally opposite of how I'm used to driving! 

I drive a manual exactly like you do and I would have a very difficult time doing what your instructor said....yikes, I would worry that I would stall the car. I never got my license while in the UK and I would imagine that I wouldn't be able to break that habit. I wonder why they are so technical about it...if you can drive a stick, you can drive a stick? I think road safety is more important than the technique of how you push down on a cutch and brake.

Mrs. R - you certainly have a knack of finding your local JW's. I remember the guy at your bus stop a few years ago.   

I'm sure it's illegal to drive with a busted side mirror

It depends - If it was the left mirror you broke, probably not.

The Construction & Use Regulations specify that for cars from 1978 onward you must have an outside mirror on the right plus either an interior mirror or an outside mirror on the left.   So a broken outside mirror on the left isn't illegal so long as you still have an interior mirror which gives a view to the rear (i.e. no blacked out rear window, etc.).

For cars prior to 1978, the only requirement is to have at least one mirror which gives a view to the rear, and it may be located anywhere.

It depends - If it was the left mirror you broke, probably not.

The Construction & Use Regulations specify that for cars from 1978 onward you must have an outside mirror on the right plus either an interior mirror or an outside mirror on the left.   So a broken outside mirror on the left isn't illegal so long as you still have an interior mirror which gives a view to the rear (i.e. no blacked out rear window, etc.).

For cars prior to 1978, the only requirement is to have at least one mirror which gives a view to the rear, and it may be located anywhere.

DH says it's not a problem at all, and we can just get it fixed when we go for our next MOT. The mechanical bits (there is an automatic switch inside the car to move the mirror) are all perfectly intact, only the glass was broken, so it shouldn't cost much to fix it anyway.

If you don't really need the left mirror, why not just leave it off altogether so dopes like me don't have anything to worry about! 

If you don't really need the left mirror, why not just leave it off altogether so dopes like me don't have anything to worry about! 

When I learned to drive -- many eons ago admittedly -- cars had only the driver's side mirror plus the inside one.  No passenger side at all.  So I tend to rarely remember to check that side anyway.

I drive a manual exactly like you do and I would have a very difficult time doing what your instructor said....yikes, I would worry that I would stall the car. I never got my license while in the UK and I would imagine that I wouldn't be able to break that habit. I wonder why they are so technical about it...if you can drive a stick, you can drive a stick? I think road safety is more important than the technique of how you push down on a clutch and brake.

She said that the way I'm doing it - I'm not really in control of the car.  Whereas the way she wanted me to do it - I really felt like I wasn't in control of the car.   

Mrs. R - you certainly have a knack of finding your local JW's. I remember the guy at your bus stop a few years ago.   

Oh yes - I think they are following me!    Maybe I ought to start my own religion?  Oh yeah - I already have - the cheese religion.  Thank goodness, the JW bus stop dude moved away to somewhere else, I think.  I occasionally see him in another part of town, but not around here - fortunately!

Mrs. R, I agree with you. Her technique would confuse me even more. Hopefully she's just that - crazy - and was trying to make you do something that really isn't neccessary.

She said that the way I'm doing it - I'm not really in control of the car.  Whereas the way she wanted me to do it - I really felt like I wasn't in control of the car.

My instructor says the same.  It's so wierd to try to drive that way.  I learned in the US the same way you did, and I'm having a hell of a time now trying to change it.  Same thing about having to use the hand brake at stoplights; I keep forgetting.  When I asked him about it, he said something to the effect of it's safer because if you just use the foot brake, you could be rolling and not realizing it.  That just seems silly to me.  And what about automatics?  Are you supposed to put it in park at stoplights here?

Mrs. R, I agree with you. Her technique would confuse me even more. Hopefully she's just that - crazy - and was trying to make you do something that really isn't neccessary.

Sadly, this is all in the Highway Code, about not ever having the car in neutral, and all the stuff with the clutch, as well. You can fail your test if you don't do it their way. It sucks, but I guess that is how you have to learn to do it in order to pass your test, then you can do it however you want! 

She said that the way I'm doing it - I'm not really in control of the car.  Whereas the way she wanted me to do it - I really felt like I wasn't in control of the car.   

Exactly, I would have felt just like you.

Well it sounds like you are attempting to give it a go the UK way so that's a start! I am sure you will get the hang of it after some practice even though it probably seems impossible at the moment.

My instructor says the same.  It's so wierd to try to drive that way.  I learned in the US the same way you did, and I'm having a hell of a time now trying to change it.  Same thing about having to use the hand brake at stoplights; I keep forgetting.  When I asked him about it, he said something to the effect of it's safer because if you just use the foot brake, you could be rolling and not realizing it.  That just seems silly to me.  And what about automatics?  Are you supposed to put it in park at stoplights here?

As for the hand brake, when my husband was first in the US with me and he would drive me to work, he used the hand brake on a very small incline while at a stop light and I just looked at him and said "do you think you are driving a heavy equipment vehicle"? I had no idea that it was a British thing at the time.

Good point about automatics, I wonder if you have to used the hand brake?

DH says it's not a problem at all, and we can just get it fixed when we go for our next MOT.

Although it's not a requirement for the MoT inspection.  Sometimes the things checked on the MoT differ from the requirements of the Construction & Use Regulations (i.e. what is required by law), but in the case of mirrors they correspond, so a missing left-side mirror wouldn't be an MoT failure (subject to there being an interior mirror as described above).

If you don't really need the left mirror, why not just leave it off altogether so dopes like me don't have anything to worry about!

Again, you could remove it completely if you wish, so long as you have the interior & right-side mirror (post 1978 car).   

When I learned to drive -- many eons ago admittedly -- cars had only the driver's side mirror plus the inside one.  No passenger side at all.  So I tend to rarely remember to check that side anyway.

The mirrors went through pretty much the same changes in America and Britain (with the obvious reversal of the driver's side).   Through to the 1960s outside mirrors tended to be optional on most low-range cars, then the driver's side mirror started to become commonplace, then both from about the late 1970s onward.  Mid- and high-range cars might have come with one or both much earlier.

I'm not certain on this one, but I believe that the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards still only mandate a driver's side mirror plus interior mirror on new passenger cars today, even though most if not all now come with a pair of outside mirrors as standard.  Individual state laws might require them anyway, of course.

What about the rule that you must not indicate unless you see another car??  I always signal, even in parking lots.  That is a hard habit to break.  Besides, what about pedestrians?  They might like to know your intention to turn or whatever.

As for the hand brake, when my husband was first in the US with me and he would drive me to work, he used the hand brake on a very small incline while at a stop light and I just looked at him and said "do you think you are driving a heavy equipment vehicle"? I had no idea that it was a British thing at the time.

When I first moved here, and every time DH came to a stop in the car & put on the hand brake - I kept thinking WTF?!  And then it started to get on my nerves.  And I finally said - 'Gaaaah - what is WRONG with you?!  Why DO you keep putting on the hand brake every time we come to a stop?!  It's not necessary!' 

When I first moved here, and every time DH came to a stop in the car & put on the hand brake - I kept thinking WTF?!  And then it started to get on my nerves.  And I finally said - 'Gaaaah - what is WRONG with you?!  Why DO you keep putting on the hand brake every time we come to a stop?!  It's not necessary!' 

LOL! I was the same, my husband did it a few times before I finally looked at him and asked him why he was doing that with the hand brake....afterall it wasn't a scary hill.