As a direct result, I was obviously in a great mood, feeling happy all around.  i dropped off my friends and was driving back to my place...i was driving along route 1 north in princeton, and all of a sudden i see flashing lights and hear a siren right behind me....damn...being an indian kid with phish stickers plastered all over his car in a state notorious for racial profiling...didn't exactly make me feel too great...but whatever, i pull over....

the cop walks up, tells me to turn the music off....so unwillingly i cut out in the middle of a great great musical interplay between john mclaughlin and zakir hussain...

"You realize you were speeding."

"NO officer, sorry." [I was only going 60 in a 55 mile zone, so why was i pulled over??] "have you been drinking son?" "No officer." Suspicious looks all around.... "do you have any drugs in this car?" in an official threatening voice....hoping for me to crack... "of course not, officer!" Calm as ever. Hoping he doesn't follow up on this... "Has this car been stolen son?"

Now maybe it was the overwhelming joy i was feeling at the moment, or the relief that he was no longer asking about my drugs...anyway, i replied without delay,

"it was once, but I got it back." And then i start cracking up, following that up with "Just kidding, officer." Thinking, Shit, i'm screwed.

But instead, the officer starts smiling widely, and tells me to be careful and have a nice night, and leaves!! All without even bothering to discover the bagful of mushrooms [picked a while earlier from Women's Rights National Park] in my trunk.

So apparently making a silly joke to make a jaded police officer smile can work wonders....I still don't recommend doing it though!

Peace! Have fun at NYE! Hopefully i'll see everyone NYE2003!

- Sne