At some point in your life, you may find yourself getting pulled over by the police while you are giving a relatively new acquaintance a ride somewhere. Ideally, for the purposes of this practical joke, your acquaintance will be a hitchhiker, a hooker or a new neighbor.

Here's how it works:

The second you realize you're getting pulled over for speeding or any other minor traffic infraction*, become either deadly serious or panicky and upset (whatever you feel more comfortable with).

Between the point when the cop turns on his lights and the point when he arrives beside your window for the first time, tell your new acquaintance in the passenger seat that "this is definitely not good," "I ain't goin' back" or "We gonna' do this judge, jerry and eggsacueshuner right here, dawg." Basically impart to your new acquaintance that trouble is brewing. Intently stare at the policeman in your rear-view mirror while saying all of this. Right when the officer reaches your window, quickly say out of the side of your mouth to your new acquaintance, "I don't know whose car this is," then roll down your window, pleasantly greet the officer and hand him the required documents.

When the officer returns to his car to check your documents, relay to the passenger, your new acquantance, any of the following basic information (with your own personal touches added): You might have a warrant you forgot to take care of (mention "extradition" somewhere), you've been "sort of mixing business and pleasure today" ("If the pig opens the trunk, we're cooked"), you've been in this situation before, know what to do and everything will be cool so long as the passenger, your new acquaintance, stays calm. Also, "OK then, what I need for you to do is just sloooowly reach under your seat, carefully feel around for it and hand it to me."

Important! Do not positively identify "it" as being a gun, because in order to follow through with the perceived plan of handing you a murder weapon, your new acquaintance will subconsciously need plausible deniability, in that he/she didn't know what was under the seat when they grabbed for it.

You need to be very persuasive, forceful even, in your directions. In fact, a complete switch in your personality to something markedly more intense will be useful. Remember, you probably only have between 90 seconds and four minutes until the officer returns to your car. If you are entirely successful in the execution of this opportunistic practical joke, the passenger, your new scared-shitless, submissive acquaintance, will reach entirely under their own seat in search of the imaginary gun you have requested before the officer returns. If this happens, quickly say, "Not yet!" or in disbelief, ask, "What are you, crazy?"

Then carry on a normal, calm conversation with the officer who is giving you a warning for a broken taillight while the passenger, your new acquaintance, is shakily trying to reconstruct the shattered fragments of his own psyche.

Scoring high points also but not qualifying as a complete victory is some sort of pressure-induced total breakdown on the part of your new acquaintance. This may include heavy sobbing, dumb-foundedness or an instinctive pulling-up of their knees to their own seat-belted chest.

Another interesting outcome of this sociological experiment is the possibility that your new acquaintance will flee the vehicle. If this happens, your license and insurance better damn well be in order. This presents several exciting possibilities, and I recommend you stay in your seat with hands visibly glued to the wheel for all of them. Your acquaintance might get shot and die, an unappealing outcome but, then again, dead upstairs-neighbors don't tell tales. They might get shot and live, but you can fall back on the valid argument that, had they just followed your instructions, instead of hanging on by a thread in the emergency room, they could be having the time of their life rooting through a complete stranger's barn near the scene of the imaginary murder in search of the pretend lucky shovel you use every time you get in a jam like this. (If you have a friend who is a police officer, you can drag this thing out all night long.)

Or, your passenger may adamantly refuse to reach for "it" but otherwise stay cool when the cop returns. This is a good sign that your budding friendship has promise Ñ they're not going to be bullied into becoming an accomplice to a cop-killer but neither will they miss for the world the chance to see you get billy-clubbed senseless.

The purpose of this practical joke is to psychologically break someone down to the point where they spend the next several months questioning their total lack of resolve and good judgment. This likely will end the acquaintanceship but on the other hand, it would be hilarious.