What was your drivers ed. experience like? Boring. Watched videos, had lectures and then some time in a simulator. It was in the summer and formatted like a class. One day the video was so boring the teacher fell asleep. I didn't learn much other than to not drink with a straw while driving. The stories the ER nurse told us were pretty gruesome.

How old were you when you got your license? 16. I believe it was the week of my birthday. My wallet is across the room and I don't feel like getting up.

Did you pass on the first try? Yes.

Any funny mistakes while behind the wheel? Near my 16th birthday, I was practicing my driving in a community college near my parents' house. They have little areas with bushes for decoration in between rows of parking. A bird almost flew into my windshield so I swerved into/onto a bush. We were picking twigs out for about a week after.

Did you ever freak your parents out? They wanted me to drive really gradually at first. As in below 5 miles. In a flat, empty parking lot. I wasn't too happy and accelerated to about 15. Momma WC freaked.


About the going in at closing time thing: In my county, you have to get there before 4 to test when the DMV actually closes at 5. Not to mention you actually have to wait in line to get a ticket. So around here you have to get there at about 3 to test.

What was your drivers ed. experience like? I went to an extremely small high school in a small town, so my track coach taught my driver's ed class. It was really fun.

How old were you when you got your license? Sixteen.

Did you pass on the first try? Yes. In Illinois, you don't have to parallel park (at least where I took it.) If I would have had to parallel park, I probably would have failed!

Any funny mistakes while behind the wheel? I got a speeding ticket exactly a week after I got my license. I was going 63 in a 55. I hate getting in trouble, so I started crying immediately once I was pulled over. However, once the cop saw what a new driver I was, he had very little sympathy. :P

Did you ever freak your parents out? My daddy taught me how to drive, and I think I gave him a few gray hairs. However, besides that one speeding ticket, I've yet to get a ticket and I haven't gotten in a wreck, so I think my parents trust me now! :P

No problem, Tony. I had friends who were a class behind me who couldn't pass. I told them to go close to closing, they did, and they passed. It works. :)

Hmm, I wonder why. :rolleyes:

I think any passenger who has experienced your driving should give you an "automatic fail".... :)
http://youtu.be/ghOmqfL9M60

At my high school one of the driver's ed instructors literally wrote the book many of you might have used. So needless to say, our program was rigorous. But the good part is only random kids had to take the driving test withthe cop.

A funny for me is no one ever taught me how to put gas in the car. The first time I did it I was alone. The guy asked me what kind of gas (1982, they still sold leaded). I said, ummm the regular kind. So he turned on the leaded. Note to those who never dealt with this: the leaded nozzle was bigger than the unleaded hole. I was so embarrassed when I realized my mistake! Having to go back and say "I meant the other one" was horrifying to this smarter than thou 16 year old.

One of my friends got her license at 17, but she didn't pump her own gas until she was 19. She always drove her parents' cars, and she'd always just hand them money for gas, so she never filled it up on her own.

One day, me, her, and another friend were all driving around, and we needed gas. She turned to us and said, "Can one of you pump it?" We both said no way, and she said, "So, uh.. I don't know how.." We laughed, taught her how to pump it, and took pictures of her pumping gas for the first time. Best time I've ever had at a gas station.

My high school offered driver's ed classes, but enrollment was by age, and, since I was the youngest in my class, it would have been the spring semester of my senior year before I would have been allowed to take driving lessons. So my parents enrolled me at a driver's ed program at a yeshiva in Queens, NY (I kid you not) during the spring semester of my junior year.

Just before the start of my driver's ed course, my parents took me to the DMV to get my learner's permit. I passed my written test on the first try. And off I went to driver's ed. My class included both road time and classroom time. My parents also paid for additional road time with a local driving school, so, by the time it came to my road test, I had had plenty of time behind the wheel, much of it in Queens (where the drivers are bad, but not quite as bad as they are in Boston ... but I digress).

I went for my road test with 3 months' driving experience. 2 of my classmates and I were picked up by an instructor and driven over to Queens. The girl ahead of me failed her road test because she made a "rolling stop" at a stop sign, and the adjudicator barked, "YOU FAIL! AEPHI ALUM, YOU'RE NEXT!" I was as nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs, but I passed, first try.

As for freaking my parents out - my father is the WORST back-seat driver EVAR. He taught my mother how to drive, and he put the polish on my driving skills once I had my license - but I got a lot of "You didn't stop long enough at that stop sign!" and "The speed limit is 55. You're going 56. SLOW DOWN." And then there was the infamous gasp. If my father thought that my mother or I was tailgating, going through a yellow light where he would have stopped, etc., he gave THE GASP. It got to the point where my mother wouldn't drive if my father was in the car.

http://l.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/i/mesg/emoticons7/24.gif I hollered!

Same in Texas! I learned how to parallel park the week after I passed my test.

I did fine then, I guess. Now? I wouldn't even bet a dollar on my parallel parking "skills."

Thank you guys for the positive vibes =]

It's so weird reading how young you guys started lol I feel so late. I was a senior when I was 16 and the college I was going to go to didn't allow driving/cars for freshmen or sophomores so I never was in a rush to learn how to drive. Now I feel I'm playing major catch up

I hate you both. :mad: :p

In New York, parallel parking is part of the road test. You are required to park behind a parked car, but you don't have to parallel park between two parked cars. So the adjudicator points out a car, you pull up alongside, you parallel park behind the indicated car, pull up, make sure you're close enough to the curb by checking your mirrors - and that's that part of the test done.

A few years back, I had to parallel park on the left side of a one-way street in Brooklyn. (This is not part of the test, even though there are a zillion one-way streets in NYC.) Zip, zip, zip, car parked. The guy sitting on his stoop across the street was amazed that a Connecticut driver could actually parallel park on the left.

I had to parallel park during my driving test, but passed.

We had a driving school across from my HS that almost everyone went to. I started when I was 15, passed all the written tests (which, IIRC, counted as our "official" written tests) and passed the driving tests with no problem (we did about 3 of them -- one on side streets, one was on the highway and on a large hill, and the last was on the highway at night).

Life skill living in a sorority taught me: parallel parking.
Our driveway only fit 8 cars with 50 women living in the house. The street parking was only two hours. I became a pro my first week living in.

I didn't have to parallel park during my test but I'm pretty good at it. Ironically, the smaller the space, the better I am. I find it much harder to parallel park (without repeatedly having to adjust because I'm hitting the curb) in a large space than a super tight one.

Were these road tests part of your state's requirement for licensing? If so, wow.

I had to do basic traffic maneuvers - left turn, right turn, three-point turn, parallel park, and drive around a bit while obeying signs and signals (e.g. stop signs - as I mentioned upthread, one of my classmates failed her road test because she didn't come to a complete stop at a stop sign). Road tests can be taken only during daylight hours, and cannot be taken during inclement weather.

Road tests are not offered in Manhattan, because you must take your road test in "typical driving conditions" and Manhattan is anything but typical. (To this day, I avoid driving in Manhattan.) Road tests are offered in the other four boroughs, though.

I didn't have to parallel park during my test, and I was actually kind of mad about that. Between the driving hour I had that JUST covered parallel parking, and practicing A LOT, I was hoping to impress the guy giving me the test. Oh well!

I did have to back into a parking space, though. I had never done it before, but because of the driving hour that covered 3-point turns, I rocked it :D

The rest of the test was right and left turns, stopping at red lights and stop signs, and banging a u-ey.