You know who needs to take a darn furlough — the campus police officers who plop parking tickets under our windshield wipers like they’ve got a quota to fill.

I mean we’re bulldogs—throw us a bone here, or at least a warning.

Has anyone ever caught a police officer in the act of soliciting a ticket? Are they even real? Or are they more like Carmen San Diego?

Students are expected to pay more to learn less. Teachers are expected to teach less for even less.

And now the cigarette fiends who partake outside of the designated smoking areas get more leeway than students who just want to park in a world that’s free of tickets. I don’t see these campus rebels slapped with $25 fees placed inside recognizable neon orange envelopes (which has ruined the color for me by the way).

And I am a smoker. Can you imagine how much I would have to be bribed to call out my own kind?

For the students, faculty, and staff who have the luxury of living in walking distance or use a bicycle as a mode of transportation to campus, consider yourselves lucky. As for the rest of us, wondering whether we will have to scrounge up change or give that dreaded phone call to borrow money for a parking ticket is an everyday occurrence.

I don’t know about you in particular, but I don’t have enough muscle to increase my wages and enough money to power my PG&E and “The New California” on top of parking tickets. It’s no wonder I smoke.

According to a previous Collegian article, restaurant chains with over 20 locations are required to post the number of calories for items on their menu. We have all seen the infamous Subway napkin, whether that’s because Jared made you a Subway regular or because you see it in the form of trash all over campus.

In some California jurisdictions the minimum fine for littering is as high as $500, excluding the maximum fee of $1,000 for littering on highways.

But do these garbage-leaving, trash-loving, law-breaking students get fined? What a surprise — no.

If you’re curious to the reason why, it’s because someone is specifically hired to clean up their mess. I wish California State University, Fresno would hire a parking ticket fairy to take care of this mess.

At least cigarette smokers make an effort to put out their buds as close to the trash can as possible, if not in one of those sand-filled pots that are placed at random around campus (even in non-smoking areas, don’t act like we can’t see that life-size ashtray hidden in the back corner of the Peters Building.)

At least in high school parking was reasonable. Parking permits were, what, five dollars? And although there were no segregated colored lines, students abided by an unspoken agreement. The same unspoken agreement Bulldogs have (not the gang) for classroom seating arrangements.

I am sure that everyone is just as sick of parking stories as I am, and for that I apologize. But I am sick of parking tickets.