I Promise Officer, That is Not my Pot

Do I have your attention yet? If you cannot tell by the title, this will be an interesting post.

This past week I've been on the road for work, traveling the lovely state of Arkansas. On Tuesday I went to Jonesboro, accompanied by my co-worker Chassity. Before we picked up our rental car we stopped and had lunch and were more than delighted to be in the presence of a Red Hat Society group. P.R.E.C.I.O.U.S. Of course we had to take our picture with them (we are the ones in the back, not wearing purple attire and sassy red hats.)

This picture is actually very irrelevant to the story but I find it funny how quickly the day changed.

After lunch we picked up the rental. Much to our dismay the Buick SUV was filthy and had no gas. However we did not complain too much because it was that or a mini-van. After a stop to the gas station for fuel and soapy paper towels to clean the car's interior we were on the road. As we were driving through the farm lands of northeast Arkansas and listening to Celine Dion's Christmas CD, Chassity opened the glove compartment and said, "What's this??!!" I looked to see a dried, green, leafy substance. Being the calm and level headed adult that I am I began to scream, "OH MY GOSH!! THAT'S MARIJUANA!!!" I'm sure the car was swirving all over the highway too.

Before I go any further you should know that if you are ever in a pickle, do not call me as I will only freak out, squeal (Beau refers to it as a rabbit shrill, actually) and make matters far worse. Oh, and then I'll probably blog about it three days later.

Back to the pot-mobile.

Chassity began googling marijuana images on her phone to self-diagnose the substance. This convinced us that we were, indeed, carrying an illegal drug in our vehicle. I called my boss to get his opinion on what we needed to do. I also felt the need to repeatedly tell him that our location was on a highway in between Cash and Newport, Arkansas. That was important because these small southern towns are typically full of Barney Fifes just waiting for a drug bust! I kept seeing the headlines in my head, "Girl Scout Employees Arrested for Possession of Drugs." Seriously, how many times do you watch Cops and the perpetrator says, "I swear! Those drugs aren't mine, officer!!" And where does that get them? In handcuffs and a ride to the slammer!

Another thing you should know: I am, always was and always will be a goody two shoes. I mean, I've never even smoked a cigarette so I was horrified by the whole scenario. And in my heart I just knew I was about to be pulled over, searched, arrested, tried, found guilty and sentenced to a 45 year prison term. Overreact much?

Anways, we all agreed that the best thing to do was to get through the small farming towns without dumping the potential drugs out of the moving vehicle, call the Jonesboro police and meet them in town to identify what we were carrying. By the way, dumping the stuff out of rental car was discussed at one point. That happened to be the point when I was irrational but still, it was brought up.

Once we made it to town the cop looked over and smelled the alleged weed and said, "It looks just like marijuana but doesn't smell like it so I'm going to say that it's not." I quickly came back with, "Well that's not oregano in the rental's glove compartment!!" I'm sure he wanted to slap me with the latex glove he had just removed from his hand but instead humored me and said we did the right thing to call.

Chassity's cop friend who looked at the pictures she had taken of the substance said that if it was not pot it was K2, a synthetic pot.

I'm still not totally convinced that what we were transporting was not illegal. In fact, I'm going to continue to say that we found marijuana in our rental. Just because one always needs a good conversation bit tucked away in their memory.