Talked him out of giving me a ticket!

This is true!

I was booking it on a Texas two-lane blacktop to deliver a speech at yet another campaign Bar-b-que last Sunday morning when the local fuzz clocked me for 63 in a 45. And, he had me dead to rights, I was booking it through that little one-light town. I was for sure clocked.

He came up to the side of the car and said, "I stopped you because you were going 63 in a 45. He took my license, and my Insurance card, and just as he reached for his ticket book I, I said, "Hold on, if I tell you a police joke that you've never heard, will you let me off with a warning."

Bubba looked at me kind of hard, and I thought man he's gonna strap my butt for being a smartass. Then he said, "I don't think so, but let's hear it."

And here's the joke I told, it's been around awhile in several variations, and I've always thought that if the time were right, I'd try to use it talk my way out of a ticket--yes, I'm a lead foot:

There was this guy speeding in a "write-me-a-ticket- red" sports car, and when the radar car lit him up, he floored it. He was already going85 on a city street when the lights first hit him.

He screamed down the road going faster and faster, busting red lights, until he was blasting along at 105, with the police car in hot pursuit with lights flashing and siren screeching.

Finally he gave up and pulled over and the officer raced up to the car, ready to make a felony stop, yelling, "What in the hell is your problem mister, why didn't you stop ten miles back, when I first turned on my lights".

"Well, officer, two weeks ago, my wife ran off with a state trooper, and I thought you were him, trying to catch me to give her back."

It worked! He laughed and said OK, but don't speed in my town again, and handed back my license and insurance card.

Yessir!, sez I, and drove off---oh so safely and carefully, holding my smirk until I was in the next county.

Now here is what makes it especially sweet. My wife was there! Talked my butt out of a ticket and my wife was forced to witness it....dang, life can be so good sometimes. She thinks I'm a mouthy so-and-so. Showed her!

I will be especially unbearable the rest of the week. And she'll have to hear it over-and-over-and-over... for the rest our lives, about the day I talked my way out of ticket in a small Texas town!