INS1PID: Personalized Virginia license plates I have hated (part 17 in a series): special DVD commentary edition!

Ohhh yeah. So, um, this is the part where I make fun of the license plates. I do this because Virginia personalized license plates give outsiders some idea of what it's like to live among boring suburbanites who think that puns are the absolute highest form of humor.

Our official motto: "They really need to start charging more for those things."

Well, as Black-Eyed Peas might say, "Let's get it started!" Ha-ha! Ha. Um.

TAKE TOO

This is a commonly-found genus of plate: the homonym. It says, "I'm clever, because I'm able to think of words that sound like other words." In this case, the word "too" is substituted for the number "two", in the grand tradition of cinematic classics such as Teen Wolf Too and, to a lesser extent, Splash, Too.

LOV1N LF

This is another interesting sub-genre of plate, in which the driver intends to make it clear to you just how much better his life is than yours. As if that weren't annoying enough, there's the common 1-in-place-of-an-I-aren't-I-l33t trick.

N2 SHAPE

Obviously the most popular technique is to use a combination of letters and numbers to phonetically form a word. Or somewhat close to what actual words sound like; in this case, N2 actually sounds like "Entoo", which is not a word, but could potentially be the name of a Star Wars character. The message of the plate is unclear; is the driver exhorting me to get "ento shape," or herself? Either way, this plate is dripping with that annoying "Just Do It" mentality often exhibited by realtors. Thus, I place the chances this driver is in real estate at 62%.

2HOT4YU

Ah, yes. These are always particularly amusing; the "I'm hot shit!" genre. The driver has chosen to actually spend extra money at the DMV to let the world know that he is too hot for "YU". Punk.

When I spotted this plate, it was passing me by in traffic on I-66, and I had to speed up to get a better look. The driver appeared to be in his 50s, wearing a floppy hat and what appeared to be a floral shirt. I would have said it was Hunter S. Thompson, but he didn't have a giant hole in his face. Needless to say, I did not agree with the plate's supposition that the driver was 2HOT4ME.

DR MATH

This one isn't particularly infuriating... it's the "ASSMAN" genre. But it is funny, because Dr. Math is a dick for refusing to let me merge onto the I-66 on Tuesday.

You know the type. You've got a car full of groceries, you're on the on-ramp, and there's a perfect your-car-sized space to merge into. You've matched the speed of traffic so as not to slow anyone down. But then Dr. Math just has to accelerate at the last minute to box you out, nearly forcing you off the road in an effort to get to his destination 1.2 seconds faster.

Being of level-headed coolness, I decided to honk my horn at Dr. Math. As it has been pointed out by readers, I'm living outside my means, which should be obvious from the totally pimped-out '91 Maxima I'm driving these days. The entirety of the car's insides are apparently made from papier mache, including the horn mechanism, which often decides not to work. Including just then. So, there I am, furiously pounding on the steering wheel, and nothing is happening. Dr. Math is just sitting there in front of me, totally not being honked at.

Finally, after about a minute of pounding, the horn started working again. To make up for all the honking Dr. Math had missed, I proceeded to honk the horn for the next 30 seconds or so while laughing maniacally. "TAKE THAT, DR. MATH! AHHH HA HA HA HA!!!"

I'd like to think that Dr. Math's real name is Victor Von Math.