I think like flea said, driving stick (and even driving one primarily) was pretty common when I was growing up, and not so much anymore. But in high school every other person I knew was driving an old Beetle.

weather.com is telling me it is only 70% humidity in NOLA right now. I think they are mistaken.

Because IMO most people (75-80%?) over 30 know how to drive stick

I doubt it's that high for people 30-40. (I'm 33 and never even had access to a stick shift car to learn on.)

My parents were quite upset with my high school's driver's ed program because they didn't teach driving stick. For some reason, all the driver's ed cars were automatic -- and brand new, having been donated by the local GM plant. (At the end of the year, GM sold them at discount.

So after a certain point, my parents refused to own a car with an automatic transmission.

Circumcision rate also varies by area of the country within the US (which is partly correlated to ethnicity - Latinos and Asians are less likely to circumcise, so California has a lower circumcision rate than, say, North Dakota.) I would be willing to bet ability to drive a stick shift varies too - people in rural areas are more likely to have learned (some of them having begun to drive on tractors as elementary school students. Like in North Dakota.)

Kayakers in downtown Charleston: [link]

(Why yes, I am doing everything possible to avoid reading about regular expressions in Python.)

we could draw up a matrix of guys ita knows with ethnicity on one axis and where they were born on another to potentially determine snip liklihood.

then a second one where we plot where they learned to drive and where they live now to potentially determine stick savviness.

THEN we compare both to the subject's age AND BAM - pretty good hypothoses for each individual.

some of them having begun to drive on tractors as elementary school students

Like tommyrot!

My first car was a VW Squareback, so I learned how to drive stick. And have had both manual and automatic transmission off and on since. I can also drive three-on-the-tree, which I had to learn on the pickup truck on my construction job.

It's tricky driving stick in SF. About the most difficult thing I've had to do with a car is backing up a hill into a parallel parking spot with stick.

I'm circumcised and so is Emmett. I was with him when he got the circumcision too.

There's a new study out recently (last couple weeks) indicating that the drop in circumcision rates will lead to an increase in healthcare costs (mostly because of AIDS transmission rates, but also penile cancer and other STDs).

Mostly though I remember my ex the medical student complaining about having to take care of old dudes at the VA Hospital that were uncircumcised. Nast. (Apparently they weren't great with the hygiene.)

I drive stick now (speaking literally and not, sadly, figuratively). I'm 44. I'm not circumcised, but as I'm female that's just as well.