Hey everybody, this is Eric Renslo, your ASUCD Elections chair for the 2013-14 school year. If you are reading this, then it is not too late for you to run for Senate; in fact, you’re ahead of the schedule!

Petitions come out at 10:00 a.m. next Tuesday, Oct. 15. You will have until 4 p.m. the following Tuesday, Oct. 22, to collect 125 signatures from other undergraduate students. Be sure to collect a few extra signatures in case there are duplicates or some of the entries are illegible. Once you collect 125 signatures and agree to abide by our election codes, you will appear on the ballot for ASUCD Senate. It’s that easy!

And no, you don’t have to be a political science major. ASUCD loves political science majors; however, students from other majors greatly increase our diversity of thought. Engineering, science and music majors are just as encouraged to run for Senate as any other student.

There are many great reasons to run for Senate. First, our student government has an $11.8 million budget. Senators approve the budget yearly and influence where our money is allocated.

Second, senators see important legislation that affects other students. Senate meetings are frequently filled with many people voicing opinions to their student representatives. By running for Senate, YOU have the opportunity to be that student representative!

Lastly, it is a great work experience to talk about with future employers. Being a senator signals that you are a leader, an advocate for students, and able to communicate well with others. This may be the final time you have such an incredible opportunity to demonstrate all of these traits at once, unless, of course, you become a politician.

A reason that people conjure up for not running is that the pay is low. To be fair, $49/week won’t allow you to be “poppin’ bottles.” But that money can pay for your weekday lunch the entire time you are on Senate.

Being a student representative is not about the money. It’s about standing up for issues you believe in, accomplishing things you would not have done otherwise, and having fun at your weekly Thursday night Senate meetings. The money is just a bonus.

You should really consider taking out a petition and running for Senate if you made it this far. Any undergraduate student, first-years included, can run for Senate (unless you are on academic probation).

Browse through daviswiki.org/ASUCD to view the craziness that is our student government. Check out elections.ucdavis.edu to get an idea of where you could be in just a few weeks. And after you are convinced to run for Senate, take out a petition from SGAO on the third floor of the Memorial Union, room 348, starting at 10:00 AM on Oct.15. Give it a shot!

ERIC RENSLO is a senior political science major currently applying to law school. When he is not furiously refreshing his LSAT score report page, he can be reached for questions at emrenslo@ucdavis.edu.

Have you ever seen someone lose themselves in a battle against humor? From what I’ve witnessed and personally experienced, laughter can possess a person. It takes over — distorts the face, makes limbs flail in all directions, dominates your desire to actually breathe properly and sometimes it can even literally bring a person to the floor.

But what stumps me is what exactly distinguishes a joke or scenario from being “funny” or “hilarious.” Something funny might produce an LOL but something hilarious can generate a full-out ROFL.

The answer might rest solely in the reasoning that laughing itself can cause more laughter. Many people say things that are on the verge of “funny” but I think we all have at least one friend that expels this horrific type of noise that is funnier than the original joke, story or what have you.

That friend who bursts into hysterics for no specific reason, leaving all surrounding people entranced, and inevitably causing a chain reaction of crowing.

Laughter, at its simplest, is just a quick and automatic response to something funny, but certain people take it levels beyond laughter. Their responses can be more amusing than the original joke or story itself. I’ve noticed that if one is willing to relinquish themselves of all shame when laughing, then the power will be an undeniable force.

For example, my friend and I could be considered the crazies in any given room, based on the reality that the smallest thing could send us to the ground, laughing on our knees in public, or flopping in a ball on the floor of our room like idiots.

It seems like these types of laugh attacks are involuntary and uncontrollable.

On more than one occasion in the past two weeks, we’ve reached what some might consider public humiliation because of what laughter does to us. I kid you not, the look people have given us seems to read as: “Wow, should I go help those drunken fools out there? They don’t really look capable of biking home in the dark.”

This leaves me wanting to prove my insane levels of sobriety.

Even if a humorous occurrence deserves more than a casual recognition of humor, some people seem to be incapable of escaping the tamed version of self, and releasing themselves into the world of unrestrained amusement.

Does this mean that your ability to ROFL is rooted in how crazy you are in the first place? If so, then sometimes laughter can be a response to the acknowledgement that you are deranged and that you might (unknowingly or not) seek to physically show that through exaggerated sounds and gestures.

Maybe it’s because the people who can shriek and jump for joy at the smallest things are simply the ones who don’t mind that others might seriously question their mental stability.

But really, aren’t we all insane to begin with? The normal people are the ones who truly freak me out.

For those of you who have never succumbed to the force of extreme laughter, the struggle must be real. Because after all, laughter is the best medicine.

So next time you see someone struggling to survive because laughter is consuming them, don’t just stand back and watch — find something to laugh at yourself.

SAVANNAH HOLMES can be reached at skholmes@ucdavis.edu or find (and join) her ROFLing around Cuarto.

Our generation, in my opinion, has the most convoluted ideas about meeting people. We congregate in the most pungent bars, scour internet chat rooms, spend hours in dark coffee shops reading a clever book conspicuously held up to our faces for passersby to inspect.

Love though, does not conform to meticulously crafted schemes, and instead rides the ebb and flow of chance. It is the same with music. Inspiration itself seems elusive enough, and finding your musical inspiration in the form of another musician can feel impossible.

To be clear, this is not a story of boy meets girl. This is a story of melody meets harmony, of strings meet percussion. I am not interested in the story of John and Yoko. I am interested in the story of John and Paul.

My quest for a musical soul mate started around the time I had begun to branch out from my background in classical guitar. I had grown up listening to those who stood solidly on their own: Bob Dylan, Joan Baez. But I wanted to find the Simon to my Garfunkel.

I used to think this was about finding someone with great talent or similar music tastes. But really, it’s all about chemistry, as I learned from playing with some incredibly talented and driven musicians, who I have zero interest in playing with again.

When I was a freshman in high school, a boy who knew I played guitar asked if I wanted to come over after school and “jam.”  Maybe this was it, maybe the combination of our skills would produce something unique and inspiring. I had never been propositioned to “jam” before, but to my socially awkward 14-year-old self, it had that same cool ring to it as “chillin’ out” or “hanging” (two things I never did), and I enthusiastically accepted.

On the bus ride to his house, he explained to me why the Rolling Stones were completely overrated, and I agreed because opinions are a scary thing to have during puberty. When we arrived it was straight to business. He passed me a guitar and sat down at his impressive piano.

“Ready?” he said, as if we were about to take off. He looked over his shoulder as if to check if I was wearing a seat belt.

“Ready?” He asked again. I nodded because “no” didn’t sound like the appropriate answer here.

He began to play, his hands a blur as he busted into a tune that to my anxious ears sounded like a mix of jazz and ragtime. I wasn’t sure when to go, what to play. I felt like I was in second grade watching the jump rope swing by at an alarming speed while my friends waited for me to jump in.

I looked at my fingers, clasped tightly to the fret board. Do something I willed them, but they remained stubbornly clamped in the shape of a G chord, one of the five chords I knew. Eventually the rush of piano slowed and then stopped.

“Why didn’t you play?”

This felt like a trick question.

“I play mostly classical … and some chords”

“Oh … do you play any blues? Jazz?” No.

“Not really”

He stared at me for a while before deciding that we should take his dog for a walk. It felt like hours before my dad picked me up. Needless to say, I wasn’t invited over for round two.

My most wonderful music connections all came from chance and friendship. Also in my freshman year of high school, a girl with classical training was in my homeroom period. The teacher kept a guitar in the closet, and after about a week we shyly asked if we could use it.

It became routine. Every homeroom we would grab the guitar, sit outside, and for 20 glorious minutes we played and sang without restraint (or skill, for that matter). We would disturb the entire hallway as we painstakingly plucked the four chords of whatever pop or folk song we’d printed out the night before.

We began to work on harmonizing, and slowly our voices became in tune with each other, to the point where I’d sing a new song and she’d pick up harmonies after a couple tries.

We never took ourselves too seriously, so it was easy for either of us to point out when the other was off-key. To this day, she is my closest musical counterpart, and one of my closest friends. Some of my favorite songs to sing are the ones we’ve written together. All it took was four simple chords to ignite what became a four-year-long adventure.

It is chance. Serendipity. All those cliché and overused rom com themes. To find someone who is in tune with you both mentally and literally is not an easy task, but it is certainly a worthy one.

To help ELLY OLTERSDORF find her Davis musical soulmate, contact her at eroltersdorf@ucdavis.edu.

There’s a plastic bag ban coming to town, and we applaud the Davis City Council for its vote although we’re surprised that it’s only happening now.

Starting in January for major retailers, the ban will remove single-use plastic bags from the city, with the exception of produce aisle bags for sanitation reasons. We’ll still be able to purchase paper bags for $0.10, and thicker plastic bags, like the ones handed out at Forever 21, are considered reusable and will still be around.

Similar bans in other cities have generated some mixed feelings as shoppers miss the bags they previously used to line their trash cans or to pick up after their dogs. In Davis too, there may be some compromises. Students sometimes make use of the plastic to cover their bike seats on rainy days. As this helps bikers avoid unfortunately wet pants, we think it’s a fantastic way to use them, but we don’t think it’s a strong point against the ban.

In fact, the conversation seems one-sided, in part because it has already been discussed for years. Plastic bag bans are old news. Back in 2007, San Francisco became the first city to prohibit the use of plastic bags, and while others like Los Angeles may only be getting there now, we’re surprised that an environmentally conscientious like Davis wasn’t among the pioneers.

This isn’t to say that Davis has just been throwing wasted plastic into landfills. Some stores like Whole Foods and the UC Davis Stores already charge for plastic bags or have removed them completely.

This is quite sensible seeing as students generally wear backpacks on campus, and while the Editorial Board acknowledges that we don’t need legislation for changes to occur, we’re still glad the city’s finally making it official.

As for soggy bike seat problems, try investing in shower caps or switching to Forever 21 bags — the bright yellow might make you more visible on rainy days.