Hot Carl

Twice a year I find myself commenting that I am in awe that we, as a society, still deal with such an antiquated notion as Daylight Savings Time, and twice a year my husband tells me that I am starting to sound crazy when I launch a diatribe against it.  And yet, although my children are older and they actually DO sleep in if they are kept up late, I feel it is my duty as a mother, and in solidarity with parents of little ones who are now waking up at 4 in the morning, sobbing for lunch at 10, and practically disintigrating with exhaustion before dinner, to steadily rail against time change.  After all, when I’m a senior I expect to still pay education taxes even though my own children will not be in school, and so I expect that I will have something angry to say about time change for many years to come.  However, I have probably said it all already; you can read about my feelings on the subject here and here and probably elsewhere but I cannot find it.

My husband was away for a couple of days, and I don’t know what you do when your significant other is out of town, but I seem to drink a lot of wine, eat a lot of guacamole, and watch movies that, while excellent, generally don’t interest him.  This weekend I watched Little Women, which in addition to being an excellent portrayal of the book, also features two of the world’s sexiest men, at least in my opinion.  It also contains one of my favourite movie lines ever: “Over the mysteries of female life, there is drawn a veil, best left undisturbed.”  I think of this whenever I am doing some personal grooming or surreptitiously eating (the somewhat sad snack of) Snapea Crisps and rice-milk chocolate during my ladies’ holidays. 

I also watched Say Anything, which – not coincidentally – also features one of the world’s sexiest men.  I have been watching that movie on a semi-annual basis over the past 24 years, and I never get tired of it.  I never get tired of seeing that guy wearing shorts under his graduation gown belting out The Greatest Love of All.  I never get tired of the line “I gave her my heart and she gave me a pen.”  I never get tired of “Diane Court is a show pony; you, my friend, are a stallion.” 

I think I’m a show pony.

As a general rule I have a strong distaste for personalized license plates.  They remind me very much of Bruce from Sweet Valley High, with his license plate 1Bruce1.  Did you read those books when you were a kid?  I sure did, and I will tell you this: I had a very distorted view of high school based on those books.  In any case, due to my reading of the entire Sweet Valley High series in fifth grade, I have always thought that personalized license plates belong to douchebags, like the aforementioned Bruce.  However, parked in my neighbourhood is a vehicle with the license plate Hot Carl.  This has altogether changed my view, although maybe it’s more of an exception that proves the rule.  Hot Carl!  It’s fabulous on so many different levels.  I’m dying of curiosity; who IS Hot Carl?  I suppose camping out behind the vehicle to discover Hot Carl’s identity would be wrong, and would probably only serve to elevate my “crazy” status. 

Comments

  1. Personalized license plates!! There is one in my neighbourhood that reads “ROBXLVR”, and it has driven me bonkers for five years now. What does it mean? Robax Lover? Does the driver have a bad back controlled only by over-the-counter medication? Did she have a relationship with a man named Rob and it so defined her life that she got personalized license plates when it ended. SO MANY QUESTIONS.

    Yes, I read Sweet Valley High books and yes, I had a completely distorted view of high school as a result. I still really want to read Sweet Valley Confidential, though. Ten years after high school there is a terrible secret that has torn Jessica & Elizabeth apart! NOOOOO!!!!!

  2. Kerrie @ Family Food and Travel says

    Nicole,

    Oooooh, now we ALL want to know who “Hot Carl” is??
    Great choices of movies, two of my favorites. Owned them both on VHS and purchased them again on DVD. LOVE Say Anthing. One of the classics of all time and one that I will probably never tire of watching.
    Thanks for the laughs.

    Wishing you a wonderful Monday!

    Kerrie
    http://familyfoodtravel.blogspot.ca

  3. There use to be a car in our town w/ the plate NFLD DG. It drove by one day & my husband said, “I always wonder why that guy Doug feels compelled to tell everyone he’s from Newfoundland.” And I laughed because the car belonged to a woman who bred Newfoundland DOGS. After that whenever the car drove past us my husband would wave and yell, “Hello Newfoundland DOUG!” just to make me laugh.

    Hannah’s “ROBXLVR” is going to drive me crazy for days.

    I don’t care about the time change. It’s a pain to reset all the clocks in the house, but that’s it.

  4. Ha Ha Ha…In Quebec they don’t allow personalized license plates and we only plate the back of our cars, so the cops have to be behind you to get ur # LoL ..Yay socialist French Canadians in the 70s for insisting we all be equal..No “Hot Carl” name plates here loll, the best douchbags in Quebec can do to identify themselves is fancy rims, tinted windows and sponsor decals on their windsheilds.. Although sister and I did spot one the other day with a sticker that was shaped like some animal clawed his rear bumper and he had neon green rims to match the claw decal ..total douch bagginess loll

  5. What is with them asking for lunch at 10?? Why you bottomless stomaches. Gah if I ate that much, you’d have to saw out a giant wall in my house and use a crane to pull me out of there.
    I would love to drink wine. I really would. I can’t. Poop.
    My husband wants to get a personalized liscence plate. I refuse to let him look like a douche canoe on the road.

  6. “Hot Carl” is indeed an awesome license plate. I now see new potential for IRONIC USE of personalized license plates.

  7. I hate personalized license plates mainly because most of the time I can’t figure them out. What the hell is that person trying to say? What does their license plate mean? Confusion would seem to be the very opposite of the desired reaction when one gets personalized license plates.

  8. I remember Sweet Valley books. I LOVED them! I owned most of them.

  9. on your page. Please email me back.

    Thanks!

    Randy
    randydavis387@gmail.com

  10. Awesome…giftwithlove.com

  11. Excellent write-up. Furthermore, I really mean that.

    HA!! Did you think I was a spammer? You totally did, didn’t you? I’m surprised the reason for more car crashes isn’t “driver was trying to figure out the meaning of the personalized license plate on car in front”. Never read Sweet Valley. I would still think any teenager with a custom license plate was a douchebag.

  12. I know this post is ancient, but I recalled it suddenly when just yesterday morning (Aug. 22) the Metro News I was reading on the C-Train, had a picture of the license plate HotCarl. They had an article about inappropriate license plates, and said that they are looking for the owner of this car. According to the article, a Hot Carl is a lewd sexual act, but the plate was registered so many years ago, that they don’t know if the owner was referring to the sexual act. It slipped through their system of ensuring offensive plates don’t get approved. (I looked up what a Hot Carl is… ew. Sounds like torture, and perhaps a criminal act…) So there you have it. Your HotCarl is famous, as of yesterday. And I am not as blissfully naive as I was re: what constitutes sexual behaviour.

Trackbacks

  1. […] need to thank Heather and Andrea, dear readers, who let me know that my post about Hot Carl is once again relevant. The authorities are looking for the owner of the vehicle with the Hot […]

  2. […] warming up my slapping hand. That is all I am going to say about this topic, because I have said it all before. I will say this, though: for years, years my husband has been telling me that my complaints […]

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