Sweet Home Alabama

They're a gracious lot in the South. Everything is 'Sir' and 'Ma'am'.

We were driving from Memphis, Tennessee, across the top of Mississippi (dinner at a truck diner on the strip of highway that is Corinth) to Huntsville, Alabama.

Police lights flashed, and Chief Martin from Alabama State Police pulled us over for speeding. We resisted the temptation to blame the car: Hertz had upgraded us to a 2005 Mustang convertible.

Chief Martin's initial concern was the speed - but when he checked the rental paperwork against our driver's licences, he found new concerns. The car was last rented to someone else, and should have been returned to Nashville four days earlier. It appeared to be stolen. He asked me to step out of the car, searched me for weapons, and put me in the back of his squad car.

As he checked with Hertz, he popped questions at me: 'Do you have any weapons, sir? Are you sure you don't have any weapons? Do you have any drugs? What's in the boot of the car?'

My passport caused further furrows to his brow, and he called federal reinforcements to the side of the dark highway, 30 miles west of Huntsville. He also checked with Interpol.

As the federal officer said to me: 'You can understand our concerns, sir. You've been to Fiji, and Turkey, and have just come from Cuba. They're all hotspots for bombs and terrorists. Y'know, New York got a big black eye in 01 - we've got to be careful.'

But after searching the car and our luggage, they accepted our explanations and sent us on our way 40 minutes later - without even a speeding ticket. Perhaps Georgie's charm helped.

We smoked a couple of cigarettes on the side of the road, then Chief Martin bid us farewell: 'Sir, Ma'am, y'all just make me want to pull you over again.'