My local council just sold F1 for what I thought was a huge price, but maybe they should've sold it in Dubai instead.

I hate vanity plates. The only two I've ever thought even vaguely cool are:

- a Jaguar owner who lives near me who has J46UAR

- a Porsche I saw once with 911 EGO. At least it showed a sense of irony.

Wow. Some vanity plates are funny, & some are just stoopid. There's a plate around here that says IYQYQR. There's also one on an MG that says FLATTERY.

From ej's link:

Lord Hanningfield, council leader, said: "It will be with some sadness that we will be losing this little piece of Essex history.

"But we have sold it at a time when such number plates are reaching very high sale prices on the market and we have reached a deal which breaks all previous records."

Shorter Hanningfield: "We love history, but- OOOH, MONEY!"

And our council leader is an actual Lord. So there,

A Lord with a blog.

A blog typed by serfs, I expect.

That amount of money for plates? That's pretty disgusting.

I dunno. Given that people are always going to spend money on status symbols, I think it's great that in this case they're buying a status symbol that imposes no costs on anyone else in society. Indeed, the $60m raised so far from number plate auctions goes to accident-victim and special-needs charities.

I have no idea what possessed Essex county council to sit on the "F1" plate for a century. It wasn't doing the slightest bit of good to anyone sitting in the council's vaults or wherever it was.

I saw a taxi with the plate 1 at O'Hare once.

My favorite vanity plate:
PLAN AHE

Seen on an old station wagon when I was in high school, and I've remembered it ever since. Brilliant!

If the money from sales of vanity plates goes to charity, that's absolutely fine. And, yes, that numberplate should have been mine! I don't have a car, but there's no reason why I shouldn't have those plates!

I whistled for a cab, and when it came near,
The license plate said "fresh" and it had dice in the mirror.
If anything I could say that this cat was rare,
But I thought "Nah forget it, Yo home to Bel Air."

I pulled up to the house about seven or eight,
and I yelled to the cabby "Yo homes, smell ya later."
Looked at my kingdom, I was finally there,
To sit on my throne as the Prince of Bel Air.

There's a black beemer with tinted windows and "SATAN" plates in my neighborhood.

That's me.