Boing Boing editor/partner and tech culture journalist Xeni Jardin hosts and produces Boing Boing's in-flight TV channel on Virgin America airlines (#10 on the dial), and writes about living with breast cancer. Diagnosed in 2011. @xeni on Twitter. email: xeni@boingboing.net.

  • http://profiles.google.com/joshuabardwell Joshua Bardwell

    “Helium”. LOL.

    Once upon a time, at a festival that I was working as security liason, a police officer searched a camp and found a bunch of nitrous cannisters. “Carbon dioxide,” he said. “People huff it to get high.” I nodded sagely and did not correct him.

    • avgjoe

       he also called it nitrogen at one point. ya him saying helium made me laugh several times as i thought about him being taken down with a high pitched voice.

  • semiotix

    “Pᴜᴛ ʏᴏᴜʀ ʜᴀɴᴅs ᴡʜᴇʀᴇ I ᴄᴀɴ sᴇᴇ ᴛʜᴇᴍ ᴀɴᴅ sᴛᴇᴘ ᴏᴜᴛ ᴏғ ᴛʜᴇ ᴄᴀʀ!”
    “You’ll never take me alive, copper!”
    “Tʜɪs ɪs ʏᴏᴜʀ ʟᴀsᴛ ᴡᴀʀɴɪɴɢ. Wᴇ ᴡɪʟʟ ᴜsᴇ ғᴏʀᴄᴇ ɪғ ɴᴇᴄᴇssᴀʀʏ.”
    “That’s what you think, pig!”
    *****huffffffffffff*****
    “Ha ha! Your move, dancing purple fairy! How are you going to shoot me when your hands are made of Jell-O?”
    “Fʟᴇʀɢʟᴇ ʙʟᴇʀɢʟᴇ ᴍᴇʜ! Zᴏᴏᴘɪʟʏ ᴅᴏᴏᴘɪʟʏ ғʟᴏᴏ!”

  • feetleet

    Is this guy… savvy? Don’t know what he was originally pulled over for – but if it was for ‘inhaling a big balloon while driving,’ he might be onto something. It’s a misdemeanor in CA to POSSESS nitrous oxide for recreational purposes. Nitrous oxide stays in your system for a very short time, and they might have a hard time proving that’s what he was inhaling if he was able to dissipate/inhale all of the nitrous in his tank before arrest. So he thinks: well if the evidence is destroyed either way…..might as well Demi this bitch.

    • http://borborygmist.influxofdust.com/ Wayne Dyer

      It would be difficult to prove, but unless he’s got only balloons, there will be something left in the tank.  I still can’t imagine driving on nitrous.  Way too dissociative/floaty.

  • http://glitch.tl/ Michael Smith

    Small molecules are the best.

  • voiceinthedistance

    If it makes a root canal more tolerable, I would expect it would improve an arrest, as well.  

    Unfortunately, nitrous isn’t known as a high with “legs”, and they probably failed to bring along any Novocaine to help mitigate the severity of the post nitrous bummer.

    • http://twitter.com/fossilfuels Funk Daddy

      Yep, gone before he hits the backseat of the squad car.

      Maybe he had some acid to get him through booking & transition into holding

    • http://daruiburns.tumblr.com/ Dlo Burns

      Ugh he was probably stone sober by the time the cop car got to the station.

      • Antinous / Moderator

        I’m generally down before I can fumble the Reddi-wip back into the store’s dairy case.

    • http://codeflow.org/ Florian Bösch

      N2O is also used as an anesthetic, FYI. So huffing it vigorously will usually end up with you passing out and waking up with a monsterous headache.

  • http://twitter.com/pres1 Presley Martin

    Silly silly world. Give me another.

  • PhosPhorious

      There’s never a wrong time to get mellow.

  • David Pescovitz

    Whippit good.

  • ImmutableMichael

    Nang nang nang nang……

    • Wreckrob8

      That’s some nang nangs, man!

      • ImmutableMichael

        Years of practice – whipped cream has been a big influence on my life.

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_OAUXAA362EXWLYVMPJOKLFB5JQ Incipient Madness

    I can’t figure that the news guys didn’t know it was nitrous. Were they just not saying “nitrous oxide” so people wouldn’t know it will get you high?

    Was anybody thinking of Nena Hagen’s “99 Luftballons” while you watched this? Someone needs to do a mashup .

  • Gulliver

    LAPD, always focused on the big time criminals.

    “He’s got NO2 N2O, boys. We’re gonna need a lot of backup on this one!”

    Edit: Ah, for want of a proton…what’s a couple of moles between friends? :D

    • peterkvt80

      Lets hope it was N2O instead of NO2. NO2 instantly turns into nasty acid on contact with water.

  • toobigtofail

    The only thing that’ll stop a bad guy with nitrous is a good guy with nitrous.

  • Petzl

    “The officer is trying to verbalize with him…”

    Really? Is this what English has come to?

    • http://twitter.com/fossilfuels Funk Daddy

      “The officer is trying to express something in words with him…”

      So… they were writing a play together or something

    • Kenmrph

      I think the cop was trying to talk about his feelings.

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1081155379 Gary Ansorge

    They didn’t mention the guys name, so I’ll just add this shout out: “Idjit mutant. You’re not supposed to show off that ability until the asteroid gets here…” So sorry to distract Y’All. I have to get back to my ship. This Earth atmosphere is so,,,thin…

  • timquinn

    Toward the end you can tell someone hands one of the talking heads a note with the words “nitrous oxide.” Suddenly the guy knows what it is and says it with great authority. They honestly don’t have a clue. Of course, these guys spent their youth figuring out how to get into local news in Los Angeles, an extremely competitive field, instead of, you know, huffing helium, or nitrogen . . .

    • peterkvt80

      Pity it wasn’t hydrogen. That would have made a spectacular ending.

    • https://launchpad.net/~zak-mckracken Zak McKracken

       They probably tried to huff carbon dioxide but stopped again because it somehow didn’t really work

      • glittalogik

        Just on the off-chance that anyone is stupid enough to try this, DON’T. Breathing pure CO2 will fuck you up, and not in the good way.

  • Snig

    If he was truly a gentleman, he would have offered to share.

  • Ipo

     Acetylene balloons give you more bang for the buck. 

  • Scott Marr

    Wow that was one of THE most dangerous situations I have watched unfold, so glad those cops took that dirty nitrous huffing animal down!!

  • cstatman

    amazed the newscaster could babble in total cop-speak for that long.   the biggest abuse here was of the English language.

  • Barry Wilson

    I think Beck wrote a song about this, a long time ago…

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BzzQisxu3Ho

  • rick stanley

    My favorite was the guy on ‘wildest police chase’ that was shooting up meth as he was engaged in a high speed chase with police. Friggen’ classic.
    Personally, once I was smoking a joint with my brother in the car at the beach when a Broward sheriff rolled up. He has us dead to rights. So I took anther hit before I stepped out of the car. Going to jail anyway, right? Might as well take another hit. They’re not going to give it back to you.

    • timquinn

      Times have changed, I was standing out front of my place last week smoking a joint and suddenly noticed a cop car in the street and the driver looking at me. (I had my head down staring at my phone of course) I looked at him and nodded. He nodded back and drove on. Times have changed.