Different Forms Of Puns

It’s butter that way.

Sorry about being a little out of touch the past couple of months. My business partner bailed on me in January and I'm in the process of forming a new corporation with a couple of investors, hiring a new bookkeeper (my expartner's wife used to do that), arranging a storage facility, moving offices and re-organizing staff. It has been hectic.

Part of my business model is consulting. I recently had an experience that proves the value of consulting & demonstrates how consultants can make a difference in an organization. I was very impressed. I think this is a segment that I can develop with financial help.

Last week, I went out with some friends to a new restaurant (Steve's Bistro & Provisional Ales). I noticed that the waiter who took our order carried a spoon in his shirt pocket. It seemed a little strange. When the busboy brought our water and utensils, I noticed that he also had a spoon in his shirt pocket. Then I looked around and saw that all the staff had spoons in their pockets. When the waiter came back to serve our soup I asked about the spoon.

He told me that restaurant's owner had hired Andersen Consulting to revamp all of our processes. After several months of analysis, they concluded that the spoon was the most frequently dropped utensil. It represents a drop frequency of approximately 3 spoons per table per hour. Everyone started to carry a spoon & since the staff is better prepared now they reduced the number of trips back to the kitchen and are saving 15 man-hours per shift.

A few minutes later I dropped my spoon and & my waiter replaced it with his spare. (I think that he thought I was texting him). He said that he would get another spoon next time I go to the kitchen instead of making an extra trip to get it right then. Pretty smart efficiency. These are the types of little changes I plan to make as we move forward.

As we finished dessert I noticed that there was a string hanging out of the waiter's fly. Looking around, I saw that all of the waiters had the same string hanging from their flies. Before my waiter walked off, I asked the him, about the string. He lowered his voice & told me that not everyone is that observant. The consulting firm he had told me about also learned that the restaurant can save time on bathroom breaks. By tying the string to the tip of the penis, the male staff can pull the penis out without touching it and eliminate the need to wash their hands. This small change shortens the ti

We were reviewing different forms of traumatic injuries in my EMT class such as traffic collisions, gun shot wounds, and resulting effects and treatments for the injuries when my teacher pulls this one on us:

Teacher: "So what would come after falls then?"

Student: "Spinal immobilization?"

Teacher: "Winters."

Edit: some words

There are three classes of cheerios, the lower class (plain ol' cheerios), the middle class cheerios (frosted), and the elite class (honey nut). One soggy morning in Seattle, a plain cheerio awoke in his single room apartment. He looked out at the still sleepy city, blanketed in a mist of rain. He quickly got dressed and put his shoes on, this would be the day. He stood propped against the bus stop, smoking a cigarette. "God I have got to stop this habit." He thought to himself. Glancing back and forth at the bustle of cheerios, he saw her. She looked about 25, devastatingly gorgeous, and he could smell the honey from where he stood. "Excuse me ma'am," his voice quivered, "I - I think you might be the most beautiful cheerio I have ever seen." She smiled and her otherwise golden brown face grew red. " This is a long shot, but will you marry me?' She was obviously caught off guard by this, but her red lips formed the word, "Yes." They raced through the morning mist of the city, and arrived at her fathers house. The cheerio bent down in front of her father. "Sir, I would like to ask for your blessing in marrying your daughter" "No! You are a regular cheerio and my daughter needs a high quality honey nut" he snapped. "But sir." "No means no damnit!" "Sir this is very unrea-" "You come back a honey nut and you'll have my blessing, my daughter is not about to marry a low life like you." The cheerio sprinted home, tears streaming down his face. He fumbled against the lock and sprawled out on his bed. When he awoke it was early, his sheets had a dark silhouette from his wet jacket. He sat up and lit a cigarette. "Damn." he sighed to himself. Walking in front of his mirror, he noticed something different. His body was frosted! He had become a frosted cheerio! He darted out the door without shoes, reaching the honey nut household in no time at all. He banged on the door, and the beauty's father answered. "Sir I am a changed cheerio! I'm frosted!" he exclaimed. Her father had a stern look on his face. "You think you are any better? The dirt on my boots are worth more than you." he hissed. The old honey nut slammed the door on the young frosted. He heard the deadbolt click. The newly frosted cheerio didn't take the same way home. He stood on the edge of a bridge, feeling the cool autumn wind on his sugar coated skin. Was he really going to go through with this? Was it worth it? No he was a frosted cheerio now. He couldn't get the girl, but he was a changed cheerio. He

I have written this book to sweep away all misunderstandings about the crafty art of punnery and to convince you that the pun is well worth celebrating.... After all, the pun is mightier than the sword, and these days you are much more likely to run into a pun than into a sword. [A pun is a witticism involving the playful use of a word in different senses, or of words which differ in meaning but sound alike.]

Scoffing at puns seems to be a conditioned reflex, and through the centuries a steady barrage of libel and slander has been aimed at the practice of punning. Nearly three hundred years ago John Dennis sneered, “A pun is the lowest form of wit,” a charge that has been butted and rebutted by a mighty line of pundits and punheads.

Henry Erskine, for example, has protested that if a pun is the lowest form of wit, “It is, therefore, the foundation of all wit.” Oscar Levant has added a tag line: “A pun is the lowest form of humor—when you don’t think of it first.” John Crosbie and Bob Davies have responded to Dennis with hot, cross puns: “...If someone complains that punning is the lowest form of humor you can tell them that poetry is verse.”

Samuel Johnson, the eighteenth century self-appointed custodian of the English language, once thundered, “To trifle with the vocabulary which is the vehicle of social intercourse is to tamper with the currency of human intelligence. He who would violate the sanctities of his mother tongue would invade the recesses of the national till without remorse... ”

Joseph Addison pronounced that the seeds of punning are in the minds of all men, and tho’ they may be subdued by reason, reflection, and good sense, they will be very apt to shoot up in the greatest genius, that which is not broken and cultivated by the rules of art.

Far from being invertebrate, the inveterate punster is a brave entertainer. He or she loves to create a three-ring circus of words: words clowning, words teetering on tightropes, words swinging from tent tops, words thrusting their head into the mouths of lions. Punnery can be highly entertaining, but it is always a risky business. The humor can fall on its face, it can lose its balance and plunge into the sawdust, or it can be decapitated by the snapping shut of jaws. While circus performers often receive laughter or applause for their efforts, punsters often draw an obligatory groan for theirs. But the fact that most people groan at, rather than laugh at, puns doesn’t mean that the punnery isn’t fu