As my husband and I were stuck in traffic last weekend, I started reading the vehicles around me.
It seems that trucks and cars are just moving billboards. People advertise businesses, opinions and hobbies with lettered signs, magnets or window stickers.
My husband has observed that people don’t have bumper stickers like they used to. Sure enough, I’ve been paying attention the past few days, and it does seem that window stickers outnumber bumper stickers.
There are as many unique window stickers as there are people, although some types of stickers are popular — those with names of politicians, for example.
Those allow us to immediately form opinions, no matter how right or wrong, about the driver.
Window stickers and bumper stickers allow people to brag on their family, like their honor-roll students, a kid in the military or stick figures showing who all is in the family‚ including the pets. Animals also get their own messages. I’ve seen stickers that say, “My dog is smarter than your honor student.”
One sticker that drives my husband and me crazy is the shape of a paw print with the words “Who rescued who?” Great message about rescue animals, but it should be “Who rescued whom?”
My husband dislikes those Baby on Board signs that were popular. He’d say, “Oh, I was gonna ram your car, but you have a BABY on board, so I won’t.”
He’s really not a mean person; he just feels it’s pointless.
Speaking of mean, last week I saw a window sticker I’ve never seen. I was behind a man driving a little pickup. He was smoking a cigarette and had his driver’s-side window rolled down. The sticker said: “Shoot your local meth dealer.”
Wow. That brings up a whole other set of problems. I wonder if that was a specialty item or if there is a manufacturer cranking out (no pun intended) thousands of these at a time.
I’ve seen lots of hunting-themed stickers — hunting-club names and things like one I saw recently: “Deer tremble at the sound of my name.” I’ve also seen “Fish tremble at the sound of my name.”
Yeti gets lots of free advertising. I’ve seen the logo on many windows. In case you just woke up from a coma and missed it, Yeti is a brand of coolers and accessories.
People also display athletic accomplishments, like running half marathons, 13.1, or marathons, 26.2. The window sticker I saw on a Jeep when I was driving to work this morning was 140.6. Seriously? Is that humanly possible? I’d probably want to brag, too, if I did an Ironman race. I’ve thought of getting a sticker that says 0.0.
I saw an actual bumper sticker the other day on a big barge of a car. It was the weirdest one yet. It said, “Ask me about my grandchildren.”
I don’t understand. Why would anyone wait to be asked?
Senior writer Tammy Keith can be reached at (501) 327-0370 or tkeith@arkansasonline.com.