Christmas parties

[lnr]

Is your work having a christmas do? Are you looking forward to it or dreading it? Is it free or do you have to pay? Are partners invited?

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Mike's christmas party was a proper corporate do, for 25 quid a head with partners invited:

• Meet in hotel, one free drink (mulled wine) then expensive bar
• Move to ballroom where there are lots of big tables, 4 or 5 other companies, large meal, drink too much wine (extra)
• Lights are dimmed and there's a disco at the end of the room

It seemed mad to have a ballroom and then only have a dancefloor the size of a postage stamp, and the music was mostly dreadful (70s disco, ABBA, modern R&B and dance), though kudos to the DJ for playing two Jam tracks back to back. I asked if he could do anything rock and his best suggestion was "Bon Jovi?".

Still, it was fun.

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Our lot aren't inviting partners, but the computing group is having a free buffet christmas lunch next Wednesday which is also the leaving do for one of our long-standing colleagues. And by genuine coincidence it seems the departmental support staff Christmas party is that evening, 5 quid a head for an enormous spread of food and an impressive array of drinks and another bad disco. Since that starts at 5 and the lunch will no doubt be quite long I rather suspect the computing group staff aren't going to get much work done that afternoon.

I'm rather looking forward to it.

Comments

[new-brunette.livejournal.com]

I'm gutted - out of 3 work-related Christmas parties (one at the current place, two at the new place) I can attend precisely none.

Current place is a "gala dinner" at the Garden House Hotel tomorrow night, with dancing afterwards. Partners invited. Work pays.

New place had a department Christmas bash on Monday night when I was going to/from Scunthorpe. I don't know what was provided for free, but there were a lot of wine glasses in the CMS central core on Tuesday lunchtime. New place also has a departmental assistant staff lunch, not for partners, next Wednesday, but again I can't go. I don't know if the IT team do something of their own accord too.

[mouse262.livejournal.com]

No the IT team don't do anything themselves. I wish they did.
Maybe the new manager will organise things ;-)

my workplace has a departmental christmas party on Monday night, which I couldn't go to, which must be the same as your one as I am also in CMS - all free.

Departmental assistant staff lunch is on Wednesday, not for partners.

[marnanel.livejournal.com]

It's free, it's in the office, there is free food and party games, and I think partners are invited.

[hsenag.livejournal.com]

ARM has a really nice do (at a rugby club) which is free with partners invited, and lots of food and booze.

[bellinghman.livejournal.com]

Ironially, the person who organised our Xmas do (free, open bar, partners expected (and one flown in from Chicago!)) has just started at ARM, so missed ours.

[bopeepsheep.livejournal.com]

I missed one through being ill the weekend before last, and the other is tonight. One in Brum and one in London, so neither particularly practical, but I had hoped to make it to one of them. Free, with (one) free drink and a buffet.

[chickenfeet2003.livejournal.com]

Ours was a dinner and disco at a hotel. C$25/head which included a decent meal, two pre dinner drinks and wine on the tables for dinner.

[caramel-betty.livejournal.com]

Yes. Not going. Free, and the company spends a LOT on it (take the amount you're thinking and make it bigger, now repeat that a few times). Yes.

[mtbc100.livejournal.com]

Apparently not this year.

Were we to have one, it would probably have been a meal somewhere average with partners invited.

Still, Dawn has turned a hatstand into a sort of slender Christmas tree.

[deborah_c]

The building we're in (we're in managed office space here) had a Christmas party last week, which I mostly looked forward to: it's nice to talk to some of the other denizens of the building and find out more about them and get to know them a little, but on the other hand I'm frantically busy at the moment. It was free (the building management paid), and was drinks and nibbles. I did mostly enjoy it, until some of the other people there did something rather cruel to upset me.

The company that I work for also have a Christmas party, which is one evening next week. Again, it's free, partners are invited, and there's even an allowance to pay for buying or hiring nice clothes. They have a college hall for it, and it's meant to have a casino, a free bar and a steel band. I was, again, mostly looking forward to it, but the aftermath of last week's leaves me feeling rather less enthusiastic.

And the group of the company that work in Cambridge (which amounts to "the company we sold in January") are having a Christmas dinner at 22. I'm not sure who's actually paying -- I think the company are, but it may be generous colleagues. That one is with people most of whom I've known for the best part of twenty years, and I'm thoroughly looking forward to.

[crazyscot.livejournal.com]

Yes (past tense - was last week). I was indifferent about it.

The company organised and paid for a biiig lunch at the Arts Theatre restaurant (it moves venue from year to year) with free bar until 4pm, partners not invited. The party then traditionally migrates, on a self-funded basis and with some partners appearing, to various pubs afterwards; the really adventurous tend to go clubbing until the small hours.

[rmc28]

MISD and CamSIS have both done "go out to lunch" which is opt-in and paid for by attendees. I've missed the CamSIS one due to being in France and am too disorganised to get to the MISD one without baby.

MISD and the CS had a paid-for joint Christmas buffet lunch thing today in the USSC. Wildly overcatered, quite fun, some people actually talked to people in the other department. As Tony was there too I took Charles and he seemed to be happy enough and not disruptive.

Tony's group is having a self-paid-for lunch on Monday to which partners but not children are invited (guess which couple required that amendment!)

[pjc50.livejournal.com]

Yes, this evening, in a Chinese restraunt. I'm somewhat looking forward to it. It's free (there is something wrong with a company Xmas do that you have to pay for) and partners are invited (but she's in Portugal :( )

[catyak]

We had one in November, mainly because it's also the company birthday. The company paid, partners were invited and there was a free bar. It was enjoyable, and it's also amusing to discover that some of your work colleagues look completely different when done up in non-work clothes, even to the point of having to look twice to confirm that it is a colleague and not a partner. We had a disco laid on but I think most people cleared out of the main hall when it started because of the noise - we were more interested in chatting to each other than dancing.

D

[dave holland (from livejournal.com)]

Yes - Christmas lunch in Corpus. I'm quite looking forward to it, it's been fun the last couple of years. It's subsidised and is followed by an afternoon in the Eagle for the ritual of attempting to achieve the largest round on the head of IT's credit card. :-)

[sparrowsion]

Loch Fyne for lunch tomorrow. Company pays, no partners. Secret Santa. Indifferent to the event. Hate secret Santa.

[dragonwoodshed.livejournal.com]

We went to the Lucky Star and ate all we could for £15 a head plus lots of wine. The company picked up the bill for us and a few partners (but they don't know about that... shhh... non-itemised restaurant bills are great). We had a great time mostly because the owners of the business couldn't make it.

Went to the Kingston after. Ahhhhh the Kingston...

[tlingel.livejournal.com]

We do have a freebie one in Mhd, but I haven't been since about 2000 as these days they're generally a bit formal for me. In theory we can go to the Cam one as well if we pay our own transport and accomodation costs - I've never been to that one.

[covertmusic.livejournal.com]

Another data point - chemistry department. A (jokey) lecture from the outgoing head of department - with random senior academics singing! - followed by drinks and buffet in the fourth-floor cafe. About an hour and a bit, two hours long, free.

Beats working.

[knell.livejournal.com]

I couldn't make the London party as I was in NY, so I went to NY's party instead (they invited visiting engineering folk, which was nice). Other halves invited, but mine was an inconvenient few thousand miles away.

Held in a fairly swank place in, er, Manhattan somewhere. Tasty food and several bars, open until about midnight. Dancing later on - dancing sysadmins are a frightening sight...

[nja.livejournal.com]

Department do is usually in the university's "posh" restaurant (i.e. not very posh at all, same food as the plebs downstairs are eating but with slightly better crockery). This year it was at a proper restaurant in town, and was too far away from Christmas, too expensive and a leaving do for two people I don't get on with¹, so I didn't go.

School no. 1 I've already described, and was lovely. School no. 2 always clashes, I'd like to go but it's never been possible. School no. 1 is also having a posh do for staff at the Holiday Inn on Monday, which involves dressing up, paying too much for what will (based on my two meals at the Holiday Inn) be crap food, and involves either karaoke or some sort of tribute band cabaret thing, either of which would make me want to chew my own arm off.

¹One I liked a lot while he was an undergrad and a PhD student, but he's been an utter pain in the arse as a lecturer. He's leaving after one year because he doesn't want to do any publishable research. The other's an elderly crotchety prof who has never liked me since I had to break the news to him that his favourite Mac software wouldn't run on the hideously expensive SGI boxes someone had sold him.

[mstevens.livejournal.com]

We're having one, dreading it, free, I don't think so.

[pm215]

There's usually a work-funded one, but this year they're postponing it to next year (when there will be money available to do it properly rather than having something on the level of "pizza in the staff room" or "fish and chips" :-)). So there's an unofficial one which is a Christmas lunch down the usual Friday-lunch pub, self-funded. I'm missing that because I'm already away for Christmas by then. I think I've missed more work dos than I've attended for the same reason. I enjoy them when I can get to them (after all, free food and I get on well with people at work) -- if I didn't I just wouldn't go...

[ex-lark-asc.livejournal.com]

I got invited to sevenstring's work do since I used to work for them, and also by virtue of being his partner; it was free, but I didn't go in the end because I still hate the thought of the place. He went, came home pissed, insisted he was fine, threw up, insisted he was fine *now*, threw up several more times and passed out. I slept in the spare room because I get panic attacks when people puke.

[bens_dad]

I've never heard of a Christmas do where you paid at any place I've worked.

DPMMS typically invite me to two dos:
* A general one for the whole department, with partners etc. early evening with nibbles and drinks, usually in a college function room. One year this was replaced with the DAMTP party in the CMS Central Core.

* Something more specific for support staff (administrators, secretaries, computer officers and cleaners; the odd academic who has done a lot for the department but doesn't have a full time position might get dragged along too). Usually a dinner + disco a bit like Mike's, which seems odd without partners. Three years ago we had a day trip to Brussels instead of the dinner dance. This year we were at the Winter Event at Newmarket Races.

The general one is totally innocuous; the specific one can be an interesting novelty. Christmas is a time when your evenings get filled up with things you wouldn't normally do with people you wouldn't normally socialize with at a time when you might otherwise consider hibernating until the sun returns.

[sphyg.livejournal.com]

We had a free no-partners lunchtime tapas thing. Last year we did a big evening dressy-up thing at the Moller Centre, but the CEO didn't like the food, silly jazz band, etc. I think smaller is easier/nicer.