I can't believe it's taken this long, but tonight I attended my first ever office Christmas party. Just to be a bit different we hired a big boat from Westminster Pier, and 100 of us headed off down the Thames at dusk downriver past Greenwich. We were all trapped on board for a full four hours so that nobody could even consider sneaking off home early, and the view of London would have been absolutely spectacular had the windows not steamed up the minute we all got on board.
All the traditional features of the office Christmas party were present, except for the photocopier and the stationery cupboard. Copious drinks were ordered from the bar, everyone attempted to sing along to Slade's Merry Christmas Everybody, and someone grabbed the ship's mop and pretended to use it as a guitar. There was something especially surreal about sailing round the Thames Flood Barrier with the Ketchup Song blaring out. However, it was on the dance floor that work colleagues suddenly started to demonstrate uncharacteristic characteristics. Supposedly straight-laced revellers suddenly proved they had rhythm, one quiet bloke was transformed by a couple of bottles of Smirnoff Ice into a jiving disco queen, and there were just a few physical hints that certain people might just fancy you rather more than you could ever fancy them. I'm sure there's also an unwritten rule that says that bosses can't dance. Instead they move around between the various groups on the dance floor, sway vaguely from side to side, and smile broadly with a look that attempts to say 'See, I'm really just like you" but fails utterly.
It was a memorable first office Christmas party, and suprisingly enjoyable. But there were clearly some people who'd done Christmas parties before, because they took a camera with them. Sigh. I guess we should all await the blackmail photos in the office email system tomorrow...
