The poet of the plates:Dan Nussbaum, author...

The poet of the plates:

Dan Nussbaum, author of “PL8SPK,” is out with a second book composed entirely of messages on registered vanity plates.

It’s titled, “YMINLA? (Why Am I in L.A.?)--An Angeleno Explains Life on the Left Coast to His Mother in Brooklyn.”

Sure, Nussbaum admits, L.A. has temperamental drivers who are likely to react to being cut off by screaming something like:

HAIBOZO YUSMELL. URTOAST YABUMYA. U8NOTHN UWORM. UAIRHED. UGOON. IM GONNA DSTROYU. YOU YESYOU. ILLRAMU, ILSUEU, ILLOWNU. BITETHS FATHEDD. EAT DUST. BLABLAH BLA.

But, the license linguist points out, there are days on the freeways when NO1 MADE ERRATIK MOVES WHEN USINGA KARFONE. NOBODI KRASHS WILE PUTTN ON MASCARA AT 75MPH. EVRY1 YIELDED 2D OTHRGUY WITH AA POLITE WAVE.

Which is why Nussbaum concludes: COME2LA ANNDD LYKE GO4IT DUUUUDE.

KOSHER MEAT, OBVIOUSLY: Marvin Asroff of Rancho Palos Verdes found an ad in a local newspaper that puzzled us. Isn’t it against the law to inquire of the religion of an iguana that’s for sale?

TICKET TO RIDE . . . AGAIN: When Angels Flight disappeared in 1969, many of the trolley’s fans held on to their unused tickets, knowing it would be back soon.

Betty Yusi of Monterey Park has eight 5-cent ducats, dated 1967. Playwright-actor Jack Larson, who portrayed Jimmy Olson on the old “Adventures of Superman” TV series, kept a ticket he bought on the old railway’s last day, May 18, 1969.

Then there’s Zoila Conan Rickard, who has three she bought in 1923.

Rickard, an actress, was rehearsing for a vaudeville sketch “in a dingy apartment on the upper echelon of Bunker Hill” at the time. But the sketch was dropped and Rickard had no reason to ascend the hill on the world’s shortest railway.

Neither Yusi, Larson nor Rickard plan to try to use their antique tickets on the new Angels Flight (temporary hours: 7:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.). After all, admission for the 60-second ride is only 25 cents.

ONE OF DREAMWORKS’ LESS EXCITING SCRIPTS: During President Clinton’s recent visit here, his helicopter landed at Pepperdine University, from where he was driven to the house of entertainment mogul David Geffen in Malibu.

One Secret Service agent at Geffen’s house radioed a play-by-play of the president’s movements back to his colleagues at the temporary command center at Pepperdine. It included this scene: “OK, it looks like he [Clinton] is getting up to leave now. Oh, he’s back down on the couch. Oh, no! Spielberg’s putting another video in. Looks like we’re going to be here until midnight.”

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Los Altos High in Hacienda Heights made the semifinals of the high school competition, “Build Your Dream Vehicle,” with an electric vehicle featuring bulletproof windows. Actually, we think an equally good deterrent would be a license plate that says ILLRAMU.