Serializing Text And Option Value From A Select Element?

I have developed my own tools for serializing form data for asynchronous calls to the server (AJAX). I have consider many times that it would be useful that when a select element has both text and option values to send both values to the server. I have thought about a couple of different ways of doing this. But first let me give an example so that there is less chance of misunderstanding.Suppose I have a drop-down list that is a select element with an option list wherein each member of the option list has both a value and a text string.
as in Code:

<select name="state"><option value="1">Alabama</option>...</select>

And suppose I composed my javascript code in such a way that the value and the code are both included with a separator. Example Code:

&state=1|Alabama&keyfoo=keybar....

and '|' is the separator.