Friendship is my least favorite Pokemon mechanic (ie. I hate you Pichu)

Raichu is my favorite pokemon. I don't even know why, but I love that little orange rat. When Super Smash Bros Melee came out I was more than a little pissed when Pichu was the unlockable character and not Raichu. I mean wtf. You downgraded! Anyway, when Pokemon Sun came out, and I found out there was an Aloan Raichu I was excited! The days of Raichu being kicked aside were over! Needless to say the first thing I did was google where to catch Pikachu. Well, I didn't get a Pikachu. I got a Pichu.

Pichu evolves with friendship! Initially I had this confused with affection, and I thought okay! If my Pichu loves me enough he'll evolve into Pikachu! That sounds easy enough. Pokemon Sun's idea of friendship is you feeding your Pokemon magic beans, and then rubbing your secondary screen until you burn a damn hole in it. So I did. I rubbed that stupid little yellow rat until my fingers wanted to fall off. This took near an eternity. When I finally had max affection and Pichu was farting rainbows and dancing while delighting in me being his dotting servant it was time to level! I threw him into battle, and I raised that little experience bar. It was leveling time! As the bar reached completion I waited anxiously for him to evolve! Nothing happened. I waited an extra second or two just to be sure, but alas, no. Wtf?

(Pictured: Not me with my non-existent Raichu >:( )

I started googling again, and it turns out that Pichu does not evolve with "affection", but with "friendship". Apparently these are very different, and for some reason there's no friggin' indicator of friendship levels in the Pokemon summary like with affection. Urgh. Fine. So how do you raise friendship? Well, the only really good ways to do it require you to be further in the game, and to unlock special things. So in the beginning you're in for a grueling mission of walking around, battling, and using items on your Pokemon hoping to appease whatever adorable creature you have been taken hostage by.

So, I did. I used Pichu in every battle possible. I doted upon him, and I served him potions and goodies. He told me how much he loved me, but I started to doubt his commitment: considering he was still a god damn pichu. He gained level after level, and I waited each time with bated breathe... as he continued to not evolve. He continued to not evolve to the point where there was no more attacks for Pichu to learn, and I was starting to miss out on Pikachu's attacks. Holy crap. What is your problem?

"Hehe! I'm the devil!"

As he grew to higher and higher level I was really starting to hate the site of him. Everytime he would pop out of his pokeball and look at me with his horrible little black eyes I thought about punching my 3DS. I finally had to stop leveling him for a while so as not to miss more attacks. Upon finding the soothe bell I quickly equipped it to him, and I just proceeded to walk around forever ignoring him. Finally, after a unit of time I can't identify I started force feeding him items in battles, and I let him level again. Eureka! That little evolution screen started, and I'm already sure this will be the most joy inducing portion of my entire save for Pokemon Sun. He evolved into a damn Pikachu. Finally satisfied I moved on to the next Pokemon on my dream team roster: Umbreon. Who I found also evolves with friendship! angrily punches 3DS

PS. You can catch a Pikachu, but in order to do it Pichu needs to "call for help", and he refused to do it. I tried for some time before giving up, and just keeping the Pichu.