Pig Latin, II: Randy Braverman’s personalized license...

Pig Latin, II: Randy Braverman’s personalized license plate went on trial Tuesday. The Department of Motor Vehicles, acting on the complaints of two motorists, is seeking to revoke it on the grounds that it is pig Latin for an obscene phrase.

Braverman, 35, of North Hollywood says the plate UKFAUYA is the initials of a small (now inactive) group he helped found, United Kids for a United Young America.

“We have been unable to find any record of this group,” said DMV spokesman Bill Madison.

A three-hour hearing was held Tuesday, with a decision expected in the next two weeks.

Braverman’s father, Howard, was optimistic after the hearing. “Our attorney showed it was not pig Latin for anything,” he said. “Pig Latin for the phrase they’re talking about would be nine letters.”

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The last frontier--gas station restrooms: Has it been years since you summoned the nerve to visit one? “They are kind of iffy when it comes to cleanliness,” says Catherine Wilson, a spokeswoman for Self-Cleaning Environments of Santa Monica.

The company is marketing a restroom that washes itself. Rather than depend on a moody attendant to do the dirty work, an owner merely turns a key, activating 39 high-pressure water nozzles that wash, soak, rinse and blow-dry the room in 25 minutes. (Toilet paper and paper towels are outside the cleaning area).

Like a daring theatrical production, Self-Cleaning is testing its act on the road--in Illinois and Indianapolis. Three Amoco stations are going to try them out.

Glenwood Garvey, president of Self-Cleaning, has his eye on an even bigger market. He hopes to have a home version of the $23,000 unit ready in three years.

Perhaps it will also have an added feature that will make the toilet seats go into the down position when neglectful husbands leave them up.

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That’s show biz, Pete: Not the most colorful person to begin with, Gov. Pete Wilson has been having trouble getting TV coverage of his L.A. news conferences of late. The other day, when he unveiled some suggested immigration reforms, the spotlight instead fell on Heidi Fleiss, who was being arraigned.

And when he made another immigration speech Tuesday, it was overshadowed by a packed news conference in Century City given by Michael Jackson’s attorney, Howard Weitzman, regarding the LAPD’s investigation of the entertainer.

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Remodeling with bulldozers: Bob Drechsler took the photo of the curiously worded sign at a Westside lot that was empty except for a portable toilet. It didn’t look like one of Self-Cleaning Environment’s models, either.

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Well excuse us!Hartford, Conn., recently was identified as the city whose air is most damaging to a car’s paint finish. A study by Meguiar’s, an auto products company, ranked four other Eastern cities in the Bottom Five. So guess who was mentioned in the headline of the press release? It proclaimed:

“L.A. NOT among list of nation’s 25 toughest environments for automotive paint.”

miscelLAny:

With 122 shopping days left until Christmas, a West Hollywood store, Don’t Panic!, is advertising what it calls “the world’s first gay tree lights--inspired by the brilliant colors in the gay Rainbow Flag.” They come packaged in “a wacky retro-’50s box.”