As some of you might remember, I wasn't too thrilled a year ago when I got stuck with the "UML" license plate. But it has grown on me. The Washington State license plate has gone through a lot of changes over the last century, and in a couple years there is going to be a another big one. The plate will contain seven digits . So, as I regard the last six digit plate on my fabulous 1996 Oldsmobile Ciera, I thought I'd do some original research.

For reasons that remain obscure, even to myself, I became interested in the UML Family. According to Tom Richardson of the Washington State Dept. of Licensing, all 1000 UML plates were distributed in Thurston County: "There are 1,000 plate sets for each three alpha characters. 000UML-999UML=1,000 All 1,000 UML were issued to Thurston County. The plates are distributed to all 39 counties as each county needs more plates. We do not pre-assign plates to the counties. We keep a 60 day supply in each county and when they drop below this level more are shipped."

So, like a birder, I started looking for other UMLs and in a month or so had collected 27 (including my own): 049, 058, 061, 065, 069, 216, 219, 321, 322, 332, 352, 388, 400, 464, 553, 633, 644, 652, 691, 703, 708, 724, 812, 816, 838, 875, 974. The chart is attached: