Vanity Plate Fail

When I got my personalized plate for Buddy the Jeep, I was slightly worried that the State of Washington would deny me. They are one of the most restrictive states when it comes to issuing vehicle tags. But either my description of what was on the plate was good enough to pass their scrutiny, or they figured out what it says and they don’t mind a dark blue Cherokee running around with “The Cutthroat” written in Spanish on one of their plates.

Some folks aren’t so lucky

3M3TIB looked harmless enough, so the state Department of Licensing granted the vehicle owner’s request for a vanity plate to go on the woman’s 2000 Ford pickup.

The party was over, however, when a cop read the personalized message in his rear view mirror as “BITEME.”

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CABRON — literally Spanish for a male goat, but slang for bastard, asshole, fucker, bitch, etc. — was requested and granted to the owner of a 2001 Ford pickup. (What’s up with Ford pickup owners, anyway?) It, too, was revoked in response to a complaint, despite the owner’s claim that all it stood for was “California Bronze.”

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For a while, UFNWISH actually adorned a 2006 Mustang. Following a complaint, the DOL rejected the owner’s explanation that he was in the military, where UFN stood for “until further notice.” Hence the meaning of his vanity was that his current vehicle “was not his dream car, but he’d wait,” officials said. Part of the reason regulators rejected that story was they were trying to figure out what was not to like about a late model red coupe.

Now, one of the other examples of denied plates was this one for a 1991 Voyager van

XPEHBAM

Anyone out there know why it was banned? (answer below the fold)

The word is Russsian and it is pronounced: Hrenwam (heavy on the H and slip a little V in with the W)

It is an insult. It is literally “Horseradish for you.”

Somewhat like the American “Fuck You”, though more like “Eat Shit”.

We Americans do excel at insulting one another.

The person who did the translation for the state was quoted as saying it meant “Up America’s Ass”. You’ll have to read the link and see if you can make sense of that, because neither I nor any of the guys at my work, hailing from as far north as Belarus and as far south as Crimea, could figure out what the hell they were talking about.

I was in at the movies a year or so ago and some “disaffected youths” of Russian heritage were goofing off in the theater. I went and sat next to them, as that usually either quiets them down or makes them leave.

They took the latter option.

As they were walking out, one of them took in the clothing I was wearing (flannel shirt, baseball hat and worn jeans) and told one of his buddies that I looked like a Kolhosnik (pronounced like it is spelled), meaning yokel or bumpkin. I replied with the appropriate “Hrenwam”, and they responded with the very American “Bird”.

The movie ended up sucking. I should have been the one who left.