Ah yes, the annual holiday luncheon. That was today. In my industry, things get reaallly slow in December. Except for the folks who man the call centers. Those have to be covered. Most everybody else will start trickling out tomorrow or Monday, at least at our backwater office here on The Planet. At least those who still have some available time off. That would not be me. Anyway, the annual holiday luncheon was today.

I remember being at work the last weekday before the holiday the first xmas of my career. It was a different job at a different place and I was a 25-year-old flunky without any experience with “computers”. I was happy to have a job but I certainly didn’t consider it a career at that time (but that’d be a whole ‘nother story). I guess I should probably not detail where I worked then but I will tell you that we partied hearty that day. Somebody came up to our [“customer” service] “window” at like 9:00 AM with a tray of chocolate cups containing Amaretto. Sure, I’ll have one of those. Thanks! I don’t remember the rest of the day. Oh, I don’t mean I got drunk at work. I’m sure we even did some actual *work*. But there was a big potluck and alcohol was available. That was at the tail-end of the three martini lunch era and at the dawning of the zero-tolerance period.

I don’t yearn for the three martini lunch era but I also don’t agree with zero-tolerance. Once in Florida, we went to a beach with a zero tolerance alcohol policy. Now, we were there with our then grade-school-aged kids and The Beautiful Aunt Suzie (who was definitely of age) and there was no way that we were gonna sit there and drink bourbon or whatever all afternoon. But. At one point, the GG drifted off and, when he came back, he had a big Sprite from the concession stand spiked with whatever was in the back of the Exxon Tanker Valdez (aka our old 1989 red minivan). Us three adults shared it. Nobody got drunk. Everybody was happy. The Beach Urchins were well taken care of. I don’t know what the answer is here.

Anyway, since I now work in private industry, on rare occasions there is alcohol at work-place parties. Not today. It was a wonderful luncheon with catered subs and salads and all kinds of potluck side dishes and desserts. Our beloved team member C volunteered to make “Cheesy Potatoes” and we all took her up on that offer although a couple others brought desserts. Alcohol? Naw. Not today. Those of us who are in the December slump lingered over our lunch but others who have to actively deal with clients grabbed a plate of food and ran back to their cubes. And some people didn’t participate at all, even to eat the catered food. And that’s okay. It is so nice to be able to hang out or not and not be judged either way.

I am not sure how I got here. I wanted to write about office xmas gifts, not to mention the latest antics of the Planet Ann Arbor school district Superwoman and her sycophants on the school board. But I veered off somewhere else and I think I am done for now. You got some memories instead. And you are happy about that.

This entry was posted on Thursday, December 15th, 2011 at 7:44 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.