Do you partake of corporate parties, or do you think they generally get you in trouble?

-- Anonymous, April 28, 2000

Answers

Any of the annual or bi-annual parties I find to be pretty safe, but I generally stay far away from the weekly happy hours. As such, I do the Christmas party, the Cinco de Mayo party and the two "Beer Walks" we have a year (essentially just a pub crawl).

It is obvious that I am not on the same page as most of the folks in corporate America though, and while my coworkers and I can relate and joke and get inebriated together, there always comes a point when I'm ready to keep going and I sense them holding back and...

...hey, are you OK? Well, drive safe. We'll see ya Monday.

-- Anonymous, April 28, 2000

The agency I work for is this strange hybrid of corporate and creative. Nobody really knows what we are, and depending on the client, we are either a buttoned up corporate strategy firm or a cutting edge creative shop. I guess that works ok for the clients, but it sure makes for some unsettling bonding experiences at a company gathering.

Everyone I work with is pretty young and mostly single, but the camps are divided evenly between Banana Republic clad yuppies and thrift store chic rebels. I would say that I fall into the second category, although I have been known to frequent Banana Republic on occasion.

We have alot of company social interaction - after work drinks, parties whatever. Inevitably someone (and yes, once it was me) ends up hooking up with the last person on earth you ever thought they'd be interested in.

Of course once the effects of the multiple tequila shots or martinis have worn off, both parties are usually humiliated beyond belief and the subject of company gossip for at least a week. Until the escapades of some other hapless drunk distracts the rabble.

Oh yeah, it's all fun and games until YOU'RE the one wearing Bob from accounting's college sweatshirt back to your apartment on the world's longest walk of shame.

Not that I would know or anything.

-- Anonymous, April 28, 2000

I try to stay away from corporate functions. If I do attend, I have to remind myself to be on my best behavior. My last job was such cake, we would take long lunches, get shitty and decide we didn't "want" to go back to work. We would say "fuck you", and "next time give me the damn vasoline before you screw me like that", we would talk about sex and blow jobs and what ever else happened to come to mind. There were only four of us that worked in the office, and we were all the same kind of open, dirty minded people. It was heaven. My job now is also very casual and fun, just not "that kind of fun". People here tend to think I am an innocent, and don't realize I am wise beyond my years. So when I start drinking and making jokes, I tend to shock a whole bunch of people. Plus everyone here is around ten years older than me and the different generation thing makes for interesting events. Example....

Two weeks in to the job, we have a little three o'clock stop working and enjoy some shrimp and beer and wine. So everyone in my office is sitting around drinking and having a good time. It was really loud in the office. My boss is talking about some woman at the old company that use to rat out her own company to people in higher power(in the meantime I am talking to one of the doctors, having our own conversation)he goes on to say she was his own "deep throat". All I hear was "deep throat", and of course it is at the sound of those words that I get interested in the conversation. So I lean over to the doctor and say, "did he just say she was his DEEP THROAT?". Of course it is at that moment that everyone stops talking and there is the little lull in conversation. My boss just looked and me and turned bright red. Luckily he started laughing, and couldn't stop. He choked out something about different generations and kept laughing. How the hell was I suppose to know it was some Nixon reference? I don't remember learning about Deep Throat in school. I just know what the term means to me. You know? You know everyone in the office was thinking, WHAT A LITTLE SLUT.

My big mouth, and the fact that it usually spits things out before I can stop it, can get me into trouble.

-- Anonymous, April 28, 2000

I got the drunkest I've ever been in my life at our 1998 Christmas party. I threw up all over myself and various bits of furniture, and was put into a taxi before 9 pm. For an entire year afterwards people seemed to think I had a drinking problem - no bastard would believe I was never that drunk normally. My birthday card that year had no fewer than 17 vomit-related comments written in it, and my wedding card followed suit.

So at the 1999 Christmas party I was my normal self - having a couple of vodkas, but nothing messy. And everybody was so disappointed!

-- Anonymous, April 29, 2000

Well, at our Christmas party last year, I did just fine. No drunken slip-ups or anything like that. It was the AFTERPARTY that got me into trouble....

The guy that I went to the party with wanted to hang out downtown after the party, and since the company had rented out the convention center for the occasion, we were right there. So we head over to our favorite bar, where he proceeds to check out anything with a pulse, while leaving me waiting for him to return with beer. To make a long story short, I was seriously fed up with being ignored and with him checking out other girls, so I took my full pint and dumped it right on his head. He looked like a pissed off cat. To this day, I don't know what made me do that. I think the people in my office are a bit scared of me still. I try not to let them see that side of my personality (impulsive, hot-headed), but they sure got an eyeful that night!

-- Anonymous, April 29, 2000

I rarely ever drink but always tend to be the guy that everyone talks about after a night out with the guys/gals from work. Once while dancing with a drunk male co-worker on a table (mostly trying to make sure he did not fall off and break his F***ing neck)I had my pants pulled down, unfortunatly I also experienced a fatal waist band failure at the same time :O) At least I wasn't wearing a lacy womens thong at the time. I actually never do, but thought that it would have been kinda funny anyway.

Another time at work Christmas party, I must have been the only guy not to hit on a rather striking looking staff member so for some reason she just walked up to me grabbed me by the crotch with one hand and assulted my tonsils with her tongue then turned and blew a kiss at the rest of the guys before leaving in a cab.

Speaking of cabs, I shared a cab home from a staff party with a woman once and for the next couple of weeks I was being eyed up by other single female staff members. I don't know what happened in her drunken mind but I dropped her off and didn't even walk her to her door.

I went to a work dinner party once, one of the guys that I work quite closly withs wife was really embarrassed when she was introduced to me. I knew her about twenty years ago quite intimatly. She was at the time a wild wild child. I don't think she wanted to be reminded what she was like twenty years ago. Well I was less comfortable around the husband after the dinner thing.

Lots of other strange things but I just do not bother going out with people I work with anymore.

Work is work and my life is very seperate.

-- Anonymous, April 29, 2000