A New Brunswick woman is angry that the provincial government has prohibited her from putting her maiden name — Weed — on a vanity licence plate.

Quispamsis resident Sharon Thorne, 57, wanted to put something original on the plate of her 2001 Mustang and decided Weed would do the trick.

"I thought, well my last name, my maiden name was original," Thorne said.

Thorne said she took her birth certificate with her to the motor vehicle branch and paid $170 to get the vanity plate, but received a call three days later saying that "weed" wouldn't be an appropriate word to use because it is slang for marijuana.

"We certainly appreciate that it's her name and it wasn't the matter of the name; it was within the larger societal connection of weed to an illegal substance," said Patricia Hyland, spokeswoman for the Public Safety Department.

Thorne said she's a grandmother who doesn't do drugs and the licence plate wasn't meant to promote drug use.

"[The name] was special to my father," Thorne said. "He was very, very proud of his last name. Everybody said when we were kids we were growing like weeds."