I LOVE THIS SIGN!!

For the longest time, every day as I walked my 15 minute route from home to school and back again, I have seen cars with this sign on the back of their automobiles. I repeatedly wanted to ask my language teacher about this sign and what it meant. My first hunch was that it meant something like, "Baby on board." Well, after literally weeks of forgetting to ask, I finally asked my teacher what this sign meant, and was surprised by the answer I received.

The symbol is actually a letter in the Russian alphabet, which makes the sound "sh" as in "she." As an aside, it also happens to be one of my favorite letters, cause it looks so cool. I reminds me of a trident without the pole or an "E" that keeled over and is stiff--like roadkill after a few days! Anyways, the symbol is the first letter on the Russian word "sheepie" (which now that I put the transliteration down into English, looks like a diminutive for sheep--"Here, sheepie sheepie!"--which, of course, makes me love this sign EVEN MORE!!! Anyways (again), the word "sheepie" literally means "thorn."

Now, here's what makes this sign so funny. What it is essentially saying is the following: "I have studded (literally thorned") tires, and so when the weather is bad, and the road are icy, you'd better not tailgate me cause unless you, too, have studded tires, you are going to rear end me as I will stop much better than you!" I just think that this sign is fantastic! I love it and every time that I see it, I can't help but chuckle a bit.