Tunnel Vision: Love Those License Plates

By Brendan O'Hallarn Wednesday, August 18, 2010

We’re in one of the few windows of the year when traffic to and from South Hampton Roads is bearable, even tolerable.

It’s still summer vacation, so the morning commute is a cinch. But it’s late enough in August that the daily summer stampede to the beach has abated significantly.

On a cloudy day, I can go both ways without a traffic jam.

Good for me, the commuter. Bad for me, the guy who complains about commuting in this space every Wednesday.

So allow me to use this no-doubt-brief interlude to talk about a completely light and fluffy topic.

All right, I’ll admit it. Tunnel Vision isn’t exactly the Pentagon Papers.

Consider this week’s topic even lighter and fluffier.

What is it with people and vanity license plates in this state?

I have never seen such a preponderance of personalized plates in my life.
And it’s not like each makes a grand statement. Ones I’ve seen in the past few weeks range from the mildly affirmative … JZUS SVS, to the gently political … DMOCRAT, to fortune-cookie banal … SUNSH1NE.

Some vanity plates are slightly more clever. I did a double take to make sure it wasn’t WYDaily/Tide ad guy Derek Mason driving past me when I saw a plate with NYY HTR. Derek is a die-hard Boston Red Sox fan.

A few daring Virginians have managed to slip risqué plates past the DMV censors, with double meanings like CORNHOLE, and combinations involving the letters F and K.

I even saw one plate online with the letters A-G-I-N-A that also had a University of Virginia logo. Naughty naughty.

My favorite vanity plates are my fellow travelers who make statements about our commuting life. In one week, I saw the plates I HT I64, and HRBT SUX. Those plates should have been issued free of charge.

Finally, there are the vanity plates that no doubt signify something, but seem like a random assemblage of letters, numbers and punctuation. Like … YY&T&RE or BBH6&FR. I’ll find myself spending minutes after passing a car like that trying to decode the message I’ve been sent. At those times, I wish my friend Bob was with me.

A childhood friend, Bob is a teacher in my home town of North Bay, Ont. In the 1980s in Canada, the cheesiest game show in history was on for a few years, called “Bumper Stumpers.” Here’s a sample:



Being a Canadian game show, the prizes were frequently lavish tokens like dinner for two. And, looking at the production values of “Bumper Stumpers,” I’m pretty sure that’s all they could afford.

Anyway, my friend Bob was an idiot savant when it came to figuring out Bumper Stumpers clues. He was unbeatable, to the point where we didn’t want to watch the show with him, which made things challenging, because we were in North Bay, Ontario, and needed things to do in the summer.

The last time I saw a plate with a notation like TTRGFZF, I wanted to call Bob up and ask for his expert advice.

What about you, WYDaily readers? What’s the best vanity plate you’ve seen on our roads? Will I be able to figure it out?

Brendan O’Hallarn writes Tunnel Vision for WYDaily. If you have an idea for a commuting/transportation issue you’d like Brendan to write about, email him at brendan@wydaily.com.