Candidates Ask: What's 'Me' Time?

Elections are supposed to be about politics and public policy and big issues. And this election has its share of all that, given the stakes.

But elections are also about people -- the kind of people who want to run for federal office. And we at AOL News wanted to get a better sense of just who these people are.

So rather than asking a bunch of boring policy questions, we invited candidates for the House and Senate to answer 10 mostly fun questions. We got a response rate of about 5 percent. And while the results aren't exactly scientifically valid, they are still pretty interesting. Here's one of them:

What do you do when you need some "me" time?

The most popular response to the question "What do you do when you need some 'me' time?" was that there's no such thing as "me" time when running for office (17 percent gave that answer). Runners up were reading (12.5 percent) and sleep (8 percent).

Other responses included cooking, singing, praying, taking a bubble bath, watching a soap opera, watching football, playing chess, running, fishing and protesting. Utah Senate candidate Sam Granato likes to work at one of his delis.

Most honest answer:

"Running for Congress is about as 'me' as anyone can get."
-- Michael Engel, independent candidate for Massachusetts' 1st Congressional District

Most revealing answer:

"I don't get 'me' time, so I drink until I can pretend I'm having 'me' time."
-- Mary Larkin, independent candidate for California's 17th Congressional District

Find other survey results here.