There was an interesting story in the Salina Journal recently about personalized license plates and the approval process each state has to go through before approving and creating them. Surely you have followed a vehicle, or sat behind a vehicle at a stoplight, and played the game of trying to decipher what the combination of letters and/or numbers stand for. Rarely did anyone know what my father’s plate meant: “XZDGOHT,” and I don’t know what kind of hoops he had to jump through to “prove” that it was not a “bad” combination of letters! Each state has their own rules and regulations for personalized plates. To have a personalized plate in Kansas, it cannot have more than seven letters, numbers and/or spaces for autos and trucks, and no more than five for motorcycles. The Kansas Department of Revenue runs each personalized tag request through a massive list of 28,562 objectionable combinations. The list grows each year as people come up with new ideas and combinations. I’m not going to waste my space or time listing some of the personalized plates that are banned; I’ll just let you use your imagination. I’m just glad to know there are strict rules that KDOR has set. In the case of my dad’s license plate, it is a “low German” slang expression for “I love you.” Seriously. It is pronounced “X-Z-D-GOAT.” As siblings, my brothers and I fought over ownership of my dad’s license plate; I lost out.

THIS AND THAT * Schlemiel, Schlimazel, Hasenpfeffer Incorporated! Sorry to hear about the passing of Cindy Williams. I loved watching the TV show “Laverne & Shirley.” * I remember when toilet paper and eggs were so cheap, we teepeed trees and egged windows.

No matter your age, it is important to continue to learn, whether by book or by experience. Actually, some of the best things are learned by experience—and not always in a good way. Here are a few things that have come to my mind recently.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY! My Daughter A daughter is a wonderful blessing, A treasure from above. Her laughter, warmth, and special charm, Her thoughtfulness and love.

* For all those years, I thought I watched Jeopardy because I liked the show since it is so challenging, and it is always fun to learn new things. That was never the case because I have not watched a single episode since the passing of Alex Trebek.

* After actor Jeremy Renner’s (Hawkeye) snowplow accident, I can now say I know who the strongest Avenger is!

* I think my favorite song, for the time being, is Aretha Franklin’s “(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman.”

If there’s one thing we can count on it’s that our language is always changing. And just when you think you can hold your own on intelligent conversations with family and friends, the wordsmiths who don’t have anything better to do than come up with new words to expand their vocabularies, well, they come up with new words. Actually, they don’t make up the new words; they listen in on conversations and observe how people are communicating on social media to “get the pulse” of our language. If you ask me, our language has gone to H-E-DoubleHockeySticks. With the pace of social media and the speed of which news travels, dictionary gurus can’t possibly keep up.

THIS AND THAT * Just so you know, the Critics Choice Awards TV show only had 1.1 million viewers as opposed to any of the football playoff games during the January 14th weekend, with the lowest rating being over 11 million. The average viewership for the football games was 18 million.

It’s that most wonderful time of the year when we find out what the dictionary brainiacs determine to be the Word of the Year. Sometimes there are surprises, and other times, duds. You just gotta “take what you git and don’t pitch a fit,” and then start using the word in your conversations, just to ramp up your style. The folks at Merriam-Webster huddled together, and three days later came out of their cave and announced to the English-speaking tribes of the world: “The Word of the Year for 2022 is... gaslighting.”

THIS AND THAT * Harry and Meghan get over yourselves and grow up! Every family has some kind of drama, so we don’t need to listen to yours. * I recently read this article written by Thomas Catenacci on January 5th…“The Biden administration published a congressionally mandated report highlighting the positive economic benefits the Keystone XL Pipeline would have had if President Biden didn’t revoke its federal permits.