Those Fancy Christmas Parties

Saturday, December 16, 2006

Saturday dawned a little better for Carrie-Bri and Rose, apparently. And according to Rose, the only way her throat would not “kill her”, was if she ate Popsicles on a consistent basis. Although then it was Mom’s and Joe’s turn to come down with the sickness, whatever it was, exactly. Only Frances (of the six infected) seemed to have had difficulties with the heebie-jeebies of the stomach in particular.

It was the evening for OLeif’s NAWS Christmas party. And although it was at the Ritz in Clayton, Collette was relieved to discover that the dress code was business-casual. She couldn’t think of anything appealingly attractive about a pregnant woman dressed to the nines, no matter how elegant.

But first, there was the Christmas shopping to finish, which was finally completed by receiving two packages in the mail and taking a drive over into Chesterfield and around town.

By the time they had returned, Collette learned that Rose had already downed seven Popsicles by one o’clock in the afternoon. And she still felt badly enough not to attend the youth work project that afternoon – helping with the Angel Tree Christmas party at Westminster. And Joe was also missing out on cleaning hundreds of cars in the barely-September weather. He was probably sitting at home, thinking about all of them with a wishful sigh.

The prospective weather was rather disappointing – another likely non-white Christmas. Collette heard the night before that St. Louis had only seen 22 white Christmases in the past 113 years. Several of those had been in her lifetime. And so the probability was quite slim.

Meanwhile, Collette absently thought about bringing Wuthering Heights or Quo Vadis to the Christmas party that evening, without really thinking. They would be seated at tables again with their respective departments. Reading was not optional. And this year there would be raffle tickets and likely more non-alcoholic alcohol. There would be the now-annual video presentation put together by the IT team, of which OLeif also took part in putting together. And Collette wondered if they would get back home by eleven.

Come five-fifteen, it was time to leave. And by ten-fifty, they were back on the road, headed for home.

It had been quite the celebration – they finally arrived in Clayton in the square of lighted trees and entered the lobby. Directly in front of them was the dimly lit banquet hall. But seeing as it was the Ritz-Carlton, the evening began in a separate also dimly lit room where hors d’oeuvres such as crab cakes and quesadillas were served and guests sipped virgin drinks with blinking blue ice cubes. It seemed to Collette that they had reentered their cruise ship. Perhaps it was the great ice sculpture of giant snowflakes, lit from beneath, as soon as they walked in the door.

But OLeif and Collette had arrived half an hour later (due to bottle-neck traffic on I-170) and nearly as soon as they arrived, the guests were seating in the banquet hall. There, each table also held a smaller ice snowflake sculpture set in a shallow dish and surrounded by winking tealights. Snowflakes danced on the ceilings from the disco balls, there were shadows of snowflakes on the wall, and the whole room was set up for five hundred persons. For the next hour or so, they waited, OLeif chatting with his coworkers. They also met up with Bluebird Pennies and her fiance. Her sister and her husband were also there.

But dinner was soon served following a prayer and they ate rather quickly, watching the ice sculpture continue to melt in the dish to where it was practically going to overflow. The waitstaff finally came to the rescue and removed the first dish of water, replacing the ice sculpture back in the empty dish. Collette wondered how quickly they would need to dump it out again.

Then there was the IT video presentation, (which was quite a crowd-pleaser, entitled Pimp my Mall) and the announcement of a six thousand dollar check from the employees’ contribution to a charity for small children. There were two brief speeches of thanks given by the owner brothers (the younger one being an absolute goof), and several door prizes to begin the evening, including a $200 gift certificate to a steakhouse, an Xbox 360, and three 42” plasma screen televisions. This was right before the enormous Christmas bonuses were handed out to the employees and a thirteen-piece band took the stage, followed by the stooge band-leader and singer in a white zoot suit and red ostrich feather in his big white hat. He took the lead with a great white cheeseball grin and belted out music for the rest of the night, all pieces his grandfather had written. During his breaks, the DJ returned to his position and cranked out favorites such as Jeremiah was a Bullfrog.

And while the music played on, there was gambling in the other room with play money; everyone was given five thousand to start. For every five thousand dollars won, another ticket was added to the raffle. OLeif cashed in his five thousand without attempting any of the games (as he didn’t know any of them, and Collette was even more clueless than he was). And there were little cheesecakes, little custards, little brownie cups, little souffles, fried ice cream, crepes, and everything garnished with whipped white fluff, tiny squares of decorated chocolate pieces, and berries. OLeif also requested a non-alcoholic strawberry daiquiri, which they split, and Collette drank from it with a tiny straw.

When they returned to their table, the dude in the white zoot suit had changed to a gold zoot suit, and it was about time to leave. The giant raffle would take place at eleven-thirty, including nineteen more prizes: four more 42” plasma screen televisions, two $500 VISA gift cards, two $500 Macy’s giftcards, two $500 Westfield Shopping Mall gift cards, and many other largely-sized gift cards. But there was church early the next morning. So OLeif had HR watch his raffle tickets, should he win, and they took off. The ice sculpture dish was about to overflow again – perfect timing.

“Now you take care of her,” the younger brother owner said to OLeif on the way out. “You just let me know if he doesn’t behave.” He pointed his finger at Collette.

Collette chuckled and had to conclude, once again, that OLeif did, indeed, have two very generous bosses.