The Great Escape

I just escaped the long are of the law. Oh my Gosh, I was coming home just now from a friend's house and got stopped by the police just before turning into my community. I live in Arizona, which many already know, but my license plates expired at the end of February. Now in Colorado, you have 30 days past the expiration month to get your plates. I only discovered that this was not the case in Arizona. February came and went and I totally forgot to get my plates. I remembered just last week. Its March..... You can get your plates on-line so I went on-line and still needed to change my address from Lake Havasu to Apache Junction. So unfortunately for me I changed my address before I got plates, well in Havasu you don't need an emission sticker, but here you do. So I could not get my plates until I got an emission test. Believe it or not, I got my emission today, but was waiting 24 hours to make sure the state has the record, so was getting plates tomorrow. OH and another thing, I changed my insurance to Esurance, it is so much cheaper than what I had. And I didn't have a current insurance card in my car and expired plates. AND to make it worse I had a couple beers at my friend's house watching American Idol. Its now 11 PM and the beers I drank were at 7 PM so I was fine to drive. So he pulls me over for my expired tags, I explain, he takes my license and off to his car he goes. Mean while I am wondering if I smell like booze that I drank 3 hour before I drove. So I pop a mint and spray fabreeze, just in case. I do not drink and drive. It was hours before I got behind the wheel. He comes back and I explained about laws in Colorado and that I was getting them tomorrow. He asked for my insurance, and again I explained that I just changed insurance and did not have a copy in the car, but if he wanted to follow me to my house I would print it out. He just said I have a cute dog, (my cocker spaniel, Tom, was sitting in the front seat, he refused to get in the back) and that he was giving me a verbal warning and to take care of things right away. There is no 30 days in Arizona. I said thank you and drove home. Did I just get the break of a life-time, yes I did. I will take care of everything first thing in the morning. I promise I do not drink and drive.