Name That Plate

I hate traffic. Hate it. Like Michael Scott hates Toby. The only thing that elicits more profanity from me is watching BYU football games.

Last year I wrote about my attempts to stay entertained in the car. In Virginia, the best way to do this is attempting to decipher the overabundance of vanity plates that drivers decide to hang on their cars. Recently, I found this CNN article, which claims that 1 out of 10 vanity plates in America belong to my fellow Virginians.

After two years of being a VA driver, I have found there are three types of plates, and that I have three distinct reactions to each kind:

--Type 1 - The Paris Hilton Plate: It is obviously a customized plate and grabbing for/needing attention. Its message is -- 99% of the time -- oversimplistic, annoying, and of no benefit to humanity. The only redeeming quality is that its message is clear: You don't need to think deeply in order understand what it's trying to say. I can tolerate these. Did I just semi-compliment Paris Hilton? I sure hope not.

Example: Remember that "Seinfeld" where Kramer gets "ASSMAN" as his license plate because the DMV accidentally swapped his plates with a proctologist's? See, those kind of Type 1s make this type tolerable.

--Type 2 - The Kanye West / Tom Cruise / Rosie O'Donnell Plate: These plates are obviously customized, so you know the owner wants attention. But unless you know the owner, the message they are attempting to convey is complete drivel. Incomprehensible gibberish. These annoy me to no end. I just don't understand why you would put such an esoteric message in so public a place. It's like preceding a speech with "What I am about to say is of importance" and then delivering the speech in Klingon.

--Type 3 - The Normal Plate - These are the ones that were randomly assigned numbers and letters. There is no deeper meaning or hidden message.

The problem is, thanks to Type 2, I already KNOW these have no meaning, yet I still look for them. And then I'll start conjuring up crazy things to make them fit.

Example: I saw a plate, "KBL-6602." I thought to myself "Oh, I see. The guy probably lived in Kabul from 1966-2002, then he moved to the US." I KNOW. I told you. CRAZY. This whole looking for non-existent clues, coupled with my interpreting of messages that aren't there, reminds me of why I was perpetually horrible at "Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?"

Therefore, I am enlisting your help. I need your help with the Type 2 Plates! I will try to get pictures of what I see on the road and provide my best guess. I need you to provide your best guesses in the comments -- decipher the meaning.

"Dented Jeans"? I have no clue.

At least this should provide some amusement.