50 Most Ridiculous Vanity Plates in L.A.

All photos by Amanda Lewis

Forget 140 characters: try eight!

In a city full of networking self-promoters and wannabe celebs, it's no surprise that ridiculous vanity license plates abound. That little space on the back of your car represents a precursor to the away message and the Facebook status, albeit a near-permanent one. These plates capture and make public the city's cheery self-regard, affixing tired boasts and jokes to the buttocks of the metallic shells required for any Angeleno traveling more than two blocks.

I developed an unhealthy obsession with vanity plates after moving to LA about two years ago. Here are the best of the best of the ones I've seen and managed to frantically photograph (always while stopped at traffic lights, Mom, I promise).

50.

Creative jobs in LA can be slippery to pin down. Does he buy art? Sell it? Make it? Rent it? Inspire it? Appreciate it? Appraise it? Critique it? Probably depends on the day of the week and how early he gets out of bed.

49.

I'm guessing this is what the amateur horticulturist who owns this car calls her greenhouse when she dreams of winning some grant money, bossing around grad students and peer-reviewing the backs of seed packets.

48.

Pshaw! Heathcliff was a poor man's Garfield, and you know it. Everyone knows felines prefer lasagna to milk.

47.

Not sure if this is a misspelling of "crikey" or an abbreviated homage to the wickets, creases and flat bats of the world's second most popular sport, but either way I was sort of relieved to see this guy driving on the correct side of the road.

46.

Sure, sure, I'll bet three, but I don't know if this is the best place for us to plan our shakedown of the Commerce Casino...

45.

Props on synchronizing your self-promotion by slapping your @DvinMsM Twitter handle on the back of your car, but I really can't get behind anyone who tweets more often than I go to the bathroom (e.g. about once every hour or two... tiny girl-bladders FTW!)

44.

In Los Angeles, you are whoever you say you are. Baristas introduce themselves as musicians, and musicians introduce themselves as producers. Something tells me this person served as a production assistant on a few episodes of Top Chef before his loud breathing started to give Padma the creeps and he got booted.

43.

Are you trying to go for something scary and intimidating, here? "FIRE" I would get. "GODWRATH" even. But you do understand that brimstone on its own just refers to sulfur, right? So... you may as well have gone with "ROTTNEGG."

42.

Is this, like, your pet name for your spouse or something? Gross. The whole world didn't need to know that.

41.

"Everything has like, an effect on everything else, man!" I imagine this driver realized one starry evening. This is the license plate equivalent of one of those cloying Coexist bumper stickers, and the only thing in L.A. more annoying and ubiquitous than that stupid yin-yang "S" is the first seven seconds of this Jack in the Box commercial.