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Do not rest your hand on the shift knob while driving. You can move the linkage with the gears and cause problems
In stop and go traffic it is ok to not be bumper to bumper with the car in front of you the whole time. Constantly engaging the clutch to start and stop puts a lot of wear on it much faster than normal. It's ok to wait for traffic to move a little further ahead and then slowly let out the clutch without pushing the gas pedal so you roll slowly. If you do it right the idle of the engine will get you rolling at a slow traffic speed. People might be mad you're not 10 feet further ahead of where they want you to be, but you nor they will get to your destination any quicker anyways.
If I am relaxed driving around town I try to keep the RPMs around 2k when I am at my cruising speed. This doesn't work at highway speed with our gearing though. If you pay attention to the tachometer on an automatic, you'll notice this is about the rev range those transmissions cruise at.
To add on to the above, smooth gas pedal movement is important especially if you have a passenger. I knew a guy a few years ago who for some reason was always one gear lower than he should have been when on the highway and instead of keeping his foot on the gas to keep a constant speed he would tap the gas repeatedly to maintain a speed. As a passenger you would be thrown around because the high RPM he was at from being in the wrong gear and the on and off the throttle would make the car jerk every time he hit the gas. He just didn't know any better. He wasn't going from no throttle to full throttle every time, more like no throttle to 25%, but it was enough to make you bounce back and fourth in the seat.
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