The Christmas Party

Ahhh, the Company Christmas Party. Obligatory? Dangerous? Perhaps a history of this annual event might be in order: in the early years...I'm talkin' the days of wine and roses, now...the massive quantities of alcohol delivered by suppliers, the fine black gooey hashish and the obligatory sex in the bathroom, or on the conference room table, the near disasters with cars gone terribly wrong due to substantial mis-judgements in depth perception and blurred vision. Someone always wound up crying or just passing out in the corner...later on, there was the patina of respectability, with only the truly alcoholic boor left slumbering on a little used couch somewhere. As times and morays changed, actual FOOD became the pre-eminent indicator of the worth of the party--if you weren't wolfing down the filet mignon, and the massive quantities of steamed shrimp, then you weren't at the right place. Chocolate became a significant element in the gustatory mix, the lousy sugary fountains of the stuff, and occasionally, some real lugubrious, deeply dark mud of a dark, dark bar of Scharffenberger 86% cacao...OK, I have revealed my chocolate addiction, but more on that later...of course, the frightening shift to playing games and using video game consoles and (hopefully), the occasional actual gambling opportunity still exists and can be intense enough at times to produce a fist fight or at least a spirits induced lapse in judgement...so gird thy loins, prepare for the battle, flame the shots, and don't come crying to me if mayhem lifts its bleary head. I'll be waiting for you tomorrow, happy in my boring, sober alcoholic life, bright-eyed and irritatingly bushy-tailed, with a welcome back to the living, and gratitude for friends far and near. Oh, I've got to go--I just brewed a pot of Papua New Guniea's finest beans and I think I'll go for a walk. Hic finis est.