Thursday, September 30, 2010

License Plates

"It has been so long since you posted!"

Shut up.

Here are the top four things I hate about license plates. Why four? Because I can't think of five.

4. Leaving the previous year's registration sticker on your license plate when the new sticker comes in from the DMV. The instructions that come with the new registration clearly tell you to take the old one off and place the new one on. The problem is, they are a pain in the ass to get off because they are made to fall apart when someone tries to take them off, to stop unsavory characters from stealing the sticker from someone else's plate. Because of this, people get lazy and leave the old one on. This annoys me, and with minimal effort, it can be avoided. See how bad it looks? (Also, sometimes people purposely leave a little bit of the previous year's sticker showing to make a rainbow. This is also stupid but too similar for it to be its own complaint.) 


3.  Putting the "Peel Here" sticker on your plate as a decoration. There really isn't much to say about this one. It's not a decoration, it's trash. You wouldn't display the envelope a Christmas card came in next to the Christmas card itself. It's trash! Throw it away! (For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, see below.)


2. No license plate frame. This is really my weird thing, but license plates without a decorative frame just look bad. To take this one step further, I hate the dealer frames too. If you don't take those things off, you are advertising for the dealer for free. Why would you do that? For just a few dollars, you can get a generic one that nicely frames your plate. It's the same logic behind getting a picture frame for your family photo...it just looks better.

And now, the #1 most annoying thing that has to do with my obsession with [all things unimportant] license plates...

1.  Switching the placement of the month and year stickers. This is another one of those "I'm too cool to follow the rules" things that I hate. I honesty believe that it is impossible to do this on accident, so it has to be on purpose. When you get a new, never used license plate, there is a blank spot on either side of the word California with "MO" on the left side where the month sticker is to go, and "YR" on the right side where the yearly registration is supposed to go. It's clear as day and yet some people switch the placement for some reason unbeknownst to me. This irritates me to no end when I see this.   

2 comments:

  1. Just be happy to you don't live in a state (or district w/o voting rights) that insists you place not 1, but 2, giant stickers on your windshield.

    And let me argue that there are exceptions to your rules. For those of us with classic cars, I think its cool to have 45 years (ie, half an inch) worth of stickers and the original dealer license plate frame. But other than that, I agree with your rant.

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