Tips a la Slammer

1. Don’t make a police officer’s job any easier: this means take advantage of your constitutional rights!

Have you been drinking/doing anything illegal? No.
Can I search your car? No.
Can I come into your home? No.
Take this PBT/breath test. No.

Let’s face it, if a police officer wants to perform a search of your property or of yourself, they will, but it doesn’t mean it is a legal search. That’s what lawyers are for$

If you are stopped by police while driving and they tell you to submit to a breath test, you will automatically lose your license if you refuse via Secretary of State. So I say this is the only exception to the “just say no” rule. If you refuse, poof goes your license unless you have brilliant reason to appeal that rule, and you will be taken to have a blood draw. I say it is easier to dispute a breath test than a blood draw. However, another attorney in my office argues to go for the blood draw and take the chance your blood will go missing. When making this decision for yourself, I urge you to consider the city you may be dealing with – chances of missing evidence in Detroit… vs. …well, you know.

You are, after all, innocent until proven guilty. I’m pretty sure that is how it is supposed to work anyways…

2. Probation is the judge granting you a favor by not sending you to jail.

The new trend seems to be clients asking me to have the judge send them to jail rather than extended probation. Waking up early every morning for the electronic woman to tell you the color of the day totally interferes with your important schedule. And what if you want to go party with your friends this weekend and that hooker says “blue”? Taking two weeks out of your life is a quality alternative especially because of the overcrowding 5 days equal 1 free policy, right?

3. Depending on what jurisdiction you decided to become a criminal in (innocent until proven guilty?), you may end up testing for drugs and alcohol on a daily basis even if your crime of choice has nothing to do with drugs or alcohol.

Word to the wise: Never, under any circumstances, think you will be okay if you go to court drunk or high (this means having anything in your system or just don't use drugs, people!!). Think this doesn’t happen? ...and drinking a lot of water that morning because you were super thirsty won’t work either.

4. If you end up lucky enough to get a delayed sentence or a case dismissed, make sure your arrest card and fingerprints are destroyed so when you mark “No” for ever having being charged with a crime on your graduate school application, no one else can find out the answer is “Yes”.

One hobby of mine is checking people out on the Michigan State Police criminal history database :)

5. If you are ever in a bar fight and a police officer asks you whether you want to “prosecute”, the answer is “yes”.

If you are in a bar fight, that means you are fighting, that means you are committing assault and or battery or both. If you don’t prosecute, someone will. Get it?

Wanted: Venture Capitalists

Let me let you make me some money. I’ve always wanted my own business. I still want to practice law but, you know, something on the side that I can make a lot of extra money doing that is fun and keeps me entertained (I get bored very, very easily). As soon as I obtain funding, I am opening a pet resort! My friend Jill has agreed to be my business partner because she wants to play with the dogs sometimes too and we have big plans.

How I know pet resorts are the way to go: I dropped Hailey off at a pet resort at 7 pm on a Friday and picked her up at 7 pm on a Sunday and was charged $105.00. The rate is $30 per day. In my mind I’m thinking I will be charged around $75. These pet resort people are clearly entrepreneurs because they charge $30 per day, not night, no matter how many hours in that day the pet is actually there for, then they also charge an extra $5 per day if you want your dog to have “group play time” between noon and 2 pm or something like that. Who can deny their cute wittle puppy group play time?? When I show up and they give me my grand total of course I just hand over the money because Hailey is worth it. I’m still wondering how she had group play time with her friends on Friday between noon and 2 pm when I dropped her off at 7 pm, but whatever.

Did you know if you invest just $500,000, you should expect to make $1.5 million in the first year!? I believe it. When I ran my pitch by my first funding choice, my parents asked me to send them the information so I think we are on our way!

Being a Landlord is a Fantastic Idea!

So I bought this piece of a piece house a few years back and busted my ass to fix it up and thought it would be a great rental income property. Wrong. Real estate is not an investment. I don't care what anyone else tells me.

I found a great tenant who loved the place, with no criminal history, a good credit score, good report from the past landlord and she makes almost as much money as I do, perfect right?

Well the stripper sent me an email the other day "Kelsey, I have a few questions. I know you can't control mother nature but..." Seriously?? I'm sorry the yard is flooded, do you really want to run around the yard during a torrential downpour anyways? I'm sorry the basement is wet, did I mention torrential downpour and oh yeah, freeways are closed due to flooding and basements everywhere are flooded, yours is wet, you live in Michigan. I will be right over with my spray foam again...

About Me

Here is a snapshot of my current life (no looking back, for now):

Went to Michigan State University where I learned to party and something about political science, great school, really though.

When I was small (not young, because I still consider myself that since I turn 21 every year) I wanted to be a lawyer so I could wear suits to work everyday. Since clearly political science does not get you a job, I applied to law school.

My plan was that if no law school wanted me, I would go to cosmetology school and become a stylist for major runway shows. I still remember my mom's calm reaction when I told her my back up plan, thanks for never calling me out, Mom! She's always taken my brilliant ideas in stride.

Luckily a private law school sent me a letter saying they would gladly accept $30,000 + a year from me!

Law school ended up agreeing with my intelligence and I graduated with honors. I could have done even better if it wasn't for that refrigerated can of Ragu sauce I ate the night before a final exam my first year. Did you know that if you open a can of Ragu and put the rest back in the fridge until you want Ragu again, the date on the jar means nothing?

Spent the summer studying for the bar exam - loved studying aka sitting by the pool and doing practice questions and relaxing every night to "de-stress". Passed the bar, yeah.

Had a job lined up doing commercial real estate consulting aka making phone calls to carefully selected individuals who may be interested in me saving them money off their bottom line by taking advantage of the down market... aka if you had CFO or CEO next to your name you got a phone call from me and I literally laughed when you cussed me out or hung up on me... (except for the one day when I hid in the bathroom crying to my mom on the phone about how I wouldn't want me to call me either).

After a few months of applying to anything with "legal" in the title, I got the job I have now. I am honestly so lucky to have this job. I work for a small firm in a rich neighborhood and do... here we go... probate (dead people/adults or minors who need a guardian), real estate, business law, civil litigation, criminal defense, collections, estate planning, divorce, landlord-tenant, post-judgment issues and whatever other type of law my boss tells me I need to do.

I live in a 469 sq ft studio apartment in a nice downtown small city area with my best little friend, Hailey (a Miniature Pinscher). I have an amazing boyfriend who lives nearby and is still in school. I have a younger sister, Erin, who just got married and moved to TN with her husband who is in the Army. My parents live out in "the country" and own their own company. My Dad drives around his property on a tractor and my Mom on a lawnmower. They waive to each other when they drive past. You get the picture...

Well that's all I can think of for now and my hands are starting to look like puppets and lose circulation (totally normal for me).