To Pun or Not to Pun

I’ve look back at my life every couple of years and I marvel at how much has changed. It’s been five years since we moved to our new home. It’s been three years since I left school. It’s been two years since I started the totally annoying qualification that I’m doing right now.

Making new friends everywhere you go is a given. But you know that not all friends remain in your contact list till the end of eternity. True, there comes a point in every man or woman’s life where they either lose a phone or a sim, (most often both)

But that’s not what I mean. What I mean is, not everyone survives to make it to the new list on the new phone.

You meet new people, you sort of bond, and then by the second week find out that you’ve become a group, all for one and one for all; but then by the time whatever brought you together has ended, you go your separate ways. Some of those guys might still keep in touch for years afterwards, but there will always be those few who drop out of sight and surface only occasionally, if ever at all.

But even then, as you go on, there will be those few stubborn ones that cling onto you like barnacles and refuse to let go. These are the people you look to in times of need, and they will usually help you. And these are the guys who look to you for help in their own time of need, and you’re honor bound to wield sword at their side, come dragon or fire breathing debt collector.

No one person has more than a few friends like this; and each and every one of those friends is a blessing. I’m blessed with the few I have. One of them you may have heard me mention quite a few times here, if you’ve been following me. I guess it’s about time I introduce you to my pal, my buddy, my go-to guy for tech trouble shooting, N.

We met in fifth grade; no one would have thought we would be friends, and no one would have expected us to still be buddies ten years later. So much has happened since I first bumped into him during the games period and realized that we were in the same class.

There even was a time when we were completely out of touch; till our family moved, five years ago, to where I live now. I was getting in the bus at the main road when I realized that N was the guy who had gotten into the same bus just in front of me. Turned out he lived just ten minutes away from my new home.

Who knew? Sometimes, fate does some real good stuff to you; unfortunately, we tend to take it for granted, and sort of forget all about it the next time we lose a phone or drop a mug of hot coffee on our foot.

In any case, we were back in touch again, and things got interesting. He had decided to follow the science stream, and I had opted to steer into the commerce river. This got pretty interesting, especially since he went on to electrical engineering, and other electronic gobbledygook involving wires, processors, capacitors and decapitators

I was best friends with a guy I could call and ask for help every single time my computer froze. And call I did. Virtually every day. Ask him and he’ll testify.

Since January of 2012, I have been following a two and a half year course in management accountancy. The two words in there alone tell you what it’s about: management, and accounting. But N is true to his instincts as an engineer; he hasn’t a clue what it is I really do, and time and time again, he reminds me just how little he’s aware of what my field is.

For instance, he’d tell me about this salesman who sold a friend of his a whole load of junk, and after we stop laughing, he’d say, “Yeah, you salesmen really know how to pitch your stuff,”

Notice that “you,” there? Yes, he just called me a salesman.

And another time, my phone rang somewhere around 9pm. It was N, obviously, and this is what he had to say:

“Hey, Matt. I need a favor,”

“Shoot. What’s up?”

“Look, I’ve got this really good idea about efficient led bulbs and I think I could really make a profit out of selling them,”

“Hey, that’s great! Really awesome! Lemme know any way I can help,”

“That’s why I called, man. You’re doing marketing; what’s the first thing I should do?”

Marketing. Like, seriously?

I have no idea why engineers belittle us, and take us for granted. Seriously, if you think about it, you’d realize that if it wasn’t for us, engineers would be out of a job; but I’d rather not spark an internet war, so I’ll just stop here.

But the thing about N and I? There’s no one punnier than us, and no, that’s not a typo. I swear, he and I could be a dual comedy act; the only problem was that we would crack ourselves up so bad we’d be rolling around on stage laughing more than quipping. Pun is literally N’s middle name.

Take the other day for example. I’m not at all that big on horror movies, but someone had given me The Conjuring one weekend. N came over to spend the day, and I thought we might as well watch it and see what all the hype was about.

It was a good movie, and I guess people might have really been freaked out. But, see, not us.

No disrespect intended to anyone, but the truth of it is that we were LAUGHING all the way through it. If you’ve watched The Conjuring, I don’t know, you might be frowning and thinking that there wasn’t anything even remotely funny about it. Well, for us, there was plenty.

We don’t need material to laugh. We make it ourselves. And I guess that’s why we’re such good friends. See, I can be as corny as I want with my lame old puns around him. He gets the references, and he is capable of puns even lamer and much cornier than mine.

Over the years, I realized that becoming friends with N was one of the few things I’m totally sure I did right. The guy had a lot to do with me being who I am today. He is the first person I spoke to about starting a blog, and unlike most people I know, he didn’t laugh. He’s been supporting me throughout, and yes, especially with the tech and software parts.

A shout out to N, people. Don’t break an arm patting yourself on the back, pal. I needed inspiration for a post and unfortunately, you were the first thing that sprang to mind. Oh well.

Thanks, N. You da man.