Long before cars had DVD players to entertain kids, iPods to block out other passengers and video games to avoid looking up, long car rides often revolved around license plate games. There were games to find license plates from the first 48 states to amuse people driving across country. (Finding Alaska and Hawaii earned big bonus points, which were rarely rewarded.) Other license plate games involved going through the alphabet, in order from A to Z, and seeing how long it would take, or finding numbers in the big states that started with 001 and continuing up as far as the time would allow. Today, though, for those who get dizzy playing video games in their laps or bored with movies, the games have to do with funny license plates and custom vanity plates. And, there’s no shortage of either. Sometimes the biggest challenge is deciphering the codes. Pets seem to be a favorite topic, with funny messages about loving a pet. (ILVMYPG, for example, raises the question of whether the driver loves his pug or his pig.) The same ambiguity comes with a plate like LONGBST. Is this a long Bassett Hound, or a long beast? Some plates have such funny spelling that it’s hard to know if the driver can’t spell or is just super clever (sprclvr?). Some of the most-humorous vanity license plates define a car. Favorites include the super-expensive luxury cars that are labeled with plates such as EXMRSWON or DVRCCAR to celebrate divorce settlements. Rather than being self-conscious about an old or battered car, plates seen include STILRUNS or LVDENTS. Doctors have plates with messages like FEEEEET, ILLFIXU or 2020VSN. The earliest vanity plates always brought a smile when someone figured out that CR8TIV meant creative. Since then, it’s more creativity all the time.