Practical Law

Ok, first of all forgive me if this post gets really long. It may or it may not. But right now I feel like I could write a book on this subject. Well I did learn most of this subject out of a book though. I learned the terms and stuff from the book, but the fun, social stuff we did in that class can't be learned from a book. And if I remember something later that I may have forgotten in this one blog, I may be writing on it later. So Bear with me.

So where do I start? Practical law. Not really a class I was eager to take. It was on my schedule and I had planned on getting out of precalc, but there were no good classes to take my last hour of the day. I wanted to take a creative writing class, but at the same time, my friend Becca, who I had gotten to be friends with second trimester in web design, was in the practical law class, so I didn't want to leave her.

On the first day of class, our teacher, who at first I thought seemed nice enough, made us do a classmate interview with someone else. So my friend Becca interviewed me and I interviewed her. The third question asked why you enrolled in this class. I said I didn't really want to be in this class, but my schedule basically made me. I really could have gotten out, but to be honest, the counselors seem mean, stressed, and I just didn't want to deal with their crabbiness.

So I stuck it out with this class. And boy oh boy do I regret it. Oh no, that came out wrong. I'm kidding. I DON'T regret taking this class at all. It was so much fun.

On the first day of class, I really thought it would be a boring class full of class notes and lectures. Boy was I wrong. The first day was the only day I think my teacher used the Smart Board to teach. And we were just talking about what law is.

Most of the time we just did book problems and worksheets. That may sound kinda boring, but they were actually a lot of fun. I definitely got my creative side out on these problems and worksheets. I've got a few things I'm willing to share on that too. For one book problem, we had to give a role play between an attorney and a person. So here's what mine had to say:

Attorney: What happened?
Marie: Fred, this totally reckless driver, hit my friend Al's car while we were stopped at a red light at the corner of Sixth Street and Florida Avenue.
Attorney: How much damage was caused by the accident?
Marie: My friend's car was smashed in as far as the back seat. My friend suffered a severe neck injury, four broken ribs, and many cuts and bruises. I suffered a fractured skull, facial and numerous other cuts, a broken right arm and hip, and internal bleeding.
Attorney: Well I can tell that your face hasn't healed up yet.
Marie: Excuse me?
Attorney: Oh nothing. What happened to Al is not important. Anyways how long were you in the hospital for?
Marie: Yeah, that better have been nothing. I spent six weeks in the hospital, but returned to work after twelve weeks. I missed 3 months of pay. That's ridiculous.
Attorney: How much has Fred's insurance company offered you?
Marie: They offered me a $4,500 settlement. But I thought I would come to you and see if you think it's enough.
Attorney: Do you think it's enough?
Marie: Duh! That's why I'm asking you. With how much work I missed, I don't think it's enough.
Attorney: Well, let's see what we can do about it.

Another thing I have to show is some answers from a worksheet done a few weeks ago. We were talking about property crimes. So on our worksheet, we were supposed to draw a picture of each crime happening or write a short little story on it. So for robbery and identity theft I did these:

• Robbery: Billy is a mugger. One day Billy is walking down the street. He sees Becca walking down the street. He runs up to her, grabs her purse, stabs her in the stomach, causing her guts to come out when he pulls out the knife and pushes her into the street.
• Identity theft: Billy the mugger and now murderer looks through Becca's purse and finds many useful things. He takes her credit cards and buys a gigantic flatscreen tv. Then he steals her social security card, buys a boat with her credit card, and puts the boat in her name.

I came up with some interesting stories besides those two. And another friend I made in that class, the other Chelsea claimed for her identity theft part of the worksheet said that I had stolen her identity, which is actually really funny to think about. Another thing we got into the habit of doing mostly on Fridays was legally correct fairy tale case studies. I'm not gonna put one on here at the moment because of how long this is becoming (oh story for that one too), but I might later. Now you may be wondering what a legally correct fairy tale is. Well Jack and Jill sued the Imperial Bucket Corporation for failing to put warning labels on their buckets. For case studies, we described the case, gave the parties, and solutions and stuff. I had to question this one though.

Did it ever really say that the buckets didn't have warning labels? And if they did have warning labels, is it possible that maybe Jack and Jill just can't read?

That was the first case study we did and I was surprised to learn that my teacher picked my case study and someone else's for examples of how to do a case study. Now this particular case study was almost a full page long. By the last case study we did, I was writing up to 3 pages.

They're just so fun to write. But you may not get my length joke here. So my friend Becca and I wrote really long things (much like this blog is becoming to be) in this class. Most of the time because everyone else put down short answers. One time though we both wrote really short answers and she commented saying "wow...very short responses!" So after that, mind you I know she was joking, I would go up to her and ask her if my paper was long enough for her.

And a few weeks ago, I got a really good idea for one of the case studies. I put my term paper, which is like 10 pages long, on the back of the case study and handed it to her. She told me there was no way I could or would write that much. Haha, she's right, I don't think I could write a case study that long for a fairy tale.

At the start of this class, I had my one friend Becca. By the end of the class, I had a whole lot more friends. There were four of sitting against one wall of computers. It was two of us seniors, a sophomore, and a junior. Becca knew the sophomore I guess. They were talking right away anyways. Over the weeks, we all got to know each other and really helped each other with the problems. Our junior friend even decided to find prom dresses for Becca and me even though we refused to go.

Ok, no joke here, there were times when I walked into the classroom to see my sophomore friend Sam sitting in our teacher's chair and I had to do a double take. To me they look alike. It's kinda scary. Oh that brings me to another point. When I first got to this class, I did my work and turned it in and got on the computer. But somehow I got more interested in bothering the teacher. My sophomore friend Sam had our teacher (that's it I refuse to call her teacher anymore, it's gonna be last name now, it's bugging me) for business foundations other trimesters, so she knew Hepner (that's my teacher's last name in case you didn't understand my rant in the last parentheses). And she bothered Hepner a lot too. Actually Sam abandoned our computer group a lot to go "do" her work with Hepner. I say "do" because we all know she never really got it done. Sam, if you're reading this, I'm kidding, I know you got your work done. It was fun to yell across the room to both of them sometimes.

So my friend Chelsea one day stole Hepner's phone and recorded herself singing a song she made up about Hepner. Yeah, I'm not likely to forget that for a while. So our teacher Hepner likes to stamp our papers, but I think some of us like stamping a whole lot more than Hepner did. One day Becca got a little crazy and decided to stamp my arm. I could have used the wipes to clean it, but I just let it sit there for about a week. My arm had many smiley faces and thumbs ups on it.

Oh yeah, that brings up even more points to make here. This is getting so long. Haha. While our teacher Hepner was grading things, my friends Sam and Becca would write on each others' papers and mine too, so I have some papers that are 20 out of 20s, but they say FAIL on them. Those two are so ridiculous. It was really fun to watch them fight and not get in the middle of them.

So in class there was the good side and the bad side of the classroom meaning those that did their work and those that didn't. I understand there are computers to distract people with, but honestly how can you fail a class that is so easy? Of course, I know some will tell me it was probably just easy for me, but really? I ended that class with 106%. Yeah, I did the extra credit. Now Hepner knew who would and wouldn't do the extra credit if she handed it out. Those that did it didn't need it and those that did need it didn't do it.

Becca and I liked to argue about our grades. I'm still not really sure why Hepner trusted Becca to do the grades one day. Because Becca kept trying to change her grade to something far better than 107%. Geez, Hepner don't trust Becca with your gradebook. That and Becca and I kinda got out of hand the other day and started arguing about Becca's grade on Hepner's Facebook. That was actually entertaining even though she might want to kill us now. I'm saying first-degree murder if it was premeditated, but maybe she didn't plan it out, so maybe second-degree murder. Haha.

For a law class there was some violence in it. One time a guy kicked Chelsea, so she retaliated by drawing a smiley face in permanent marker on the back of his shirt, and it hasn't come out yet or so I've heard. Then I wore the same shirt the next day and Chelsea said hey that's the shirt I drew on yesterday. I asked her nicely not to draw on my shirt. Then there was also another friend who kept getting her shoes taken away. One time they were put up in the ceiling, and they forgot where in the ceiling the shoes were. That was funny.

Oh random this is, Becca claimed the pencil sharpener didn't work. So sometime last week, I was being lazy and didn't want to walk all the way back to the band room when my practical law classroom was right there, so I went in and asked to use the pencil sharpener. It worked with my pencil. I don't know what she's talking about.

Oh and then there's the part of me telling Hepner and Sam just about everyday that I was gonna sue Becca. Well Becca tried to hit me with her car while I was riding a bike. Really though I didn't see her, she was just telling me that she saw me and then I made up that story. Becca also doesn't believe in the insanity plea, so one day she might have issues if she gets in trouble and needs to plead insanity, but doesn't believe in it.

That class is so very random at times. One day, our teacher Hepner (notice how I still call her, 'our teacher' can't help it...random rant here in the middle of this) was complaining about how Sam made her get up early to come in and play Wii. So we played Wii during her class. That was rather entertaining.

Oh the last couple of weeks I had in that class, I found it fun to go in during lunch. There were kids in there all the time. My friend Lexi was eating lunch in there everyday and she didn't have that class or any business class. Oh and Becca took her final early during lunch (cheater! just kidding), probably so she could bother Hepner during class. That exam really didn't take that long though. And I probably would have gotten 107% too if I had known the name of that one thing for those rights the police give you so you don't self-incriminate yourself. I now know those are called Miranda Rights. Way to go me! I'm smart; I'll keep telling myself that.

Somehow I don't think Becca deserves that 107%. She was in this class when she got pulled over for speeding. Who does that? Really? Really Becca? Haha. I don't think she learned a lesson like she said she supposedly did. I told her I'm taking her to court on her speeding habits.

I mentioned earlier on my Twitter, which updates my Facebook, that I am like the grammar police because on one of the worksheets I looked at to get examples of my work for this blog, identity theft was spelled as identify theft. So my status was commented on asking why I was looking at my worksheets and work since I graduated yesterday. Well it was because I was writing this blog.

There aren't many classes that I have taken that I am willing to write this long of a blog on. This one is special to me though. Now that I've graduated, I realize that this is the class I will miss the most from my senior year at CHS. This was probably my favorite class not really because of the work (even though the work had some play in it), but because of the friends I made and the totally awesome teacher I had. I don't think I'll forget this class ever. At least it's been one of those things I really hope I don't forget.

I'd like to thank my teacher Ms. Hepner for making my last trimester of high school fun filled in the area of practical law class and also putting up with me and Becca (even though we know Becca is the more annoying one, haha, just kidding Becca). And one last time I have to ask, is this long enough for you Hepner?