Without pulling the engine or completely dropping the tranny. Can I just remove the driveshaft, H-pipe, tranny cross member, and slide the tranny back and down some? Will I need to mess with the linkage at all? Is this reasonable or am I just being dumb?
By the time you have disconnected everything necessary to do that, the tranny is practically out. Now would be the time to replace the input shaft and tailshaft seals, filler o-ring, and maybe the pan gasket and filter.