THEY'VE started talking about me. Nothing surprising there, I hear you say and – indeed – if they're talking about me, they're leaving someone else alone. But it's the same thing year after year: "But why aren't you coming to the Christmas Night Out?"
And every year, my answer is the same. "I'm not going to come because I don't actually like any of you. Never have." My colleagues always laugh nervously and then go: "Oh, you!" in that special voice that they reserve for cuddly, wuddly, wittle puppi
es and the like. If that doesn't prove my point, I don't know what does.
I detest work Christmas nights out – mine or anyone else's. You know how little fun it is to have your favourite boozer taken over for an hour or two by a bunch of accountants fired up on three glasses of cava and a Baileys – imagine how little fun it is to be stuck with them all night long.
Is it not bad enough that I have to work eight hours a day, five days a week with these eejits? Do I really have to feign interest in their personal lives as we pull crackers over the prawn cocktail? Smiling grimly as Jonathan from production tells you all about his model train collection, all the while trying to force down the slices of rubbery turkey that some hotel deems acceptable 'Yuletide Fayre'? I doubt that even Linda Lovelace could overcome the gag reflex induced by that particular combination.
I don't even stop to pass the time of day with these people when I am paid by the firm to be in their company. Why on earth would I hand over my hard-earned moolah, and give up my own time to hear about Hilda's collection of thimbles?
In fairness to them, I doubt very much that they want to hear my theories about whodunnit on Midsomer Murders (have you ever noticed that Joyce Barnaby is present at a lot of these events?). Nor do they want to listen to me hold forth on what Liz McDonald should be doing with her wardrobe (burning it, mainly).
The additional problem with these nights out is that they are only ever made barely tolerable by the presence of alcohol. Lots of alcohol. Lots and lots of alcohol. And, as is always the way with these things, the greater your need for a drink is in inverse proportion to the quality of the bevvy on offer.
The only way to drink cheap, undrinkable rubbish is very, very quickly. Which means that I am then in the same boat as Maisie from finance (who only ever has the "one wee drink at Christmas time, hee hee"). We are both newt-like by the time the Christmas pudding comes round. A few flaming sambucas later and we're both in the toilets crying about the injustices of life. A brief moment of solidarity ensues until she goes and spoils a boodiful, boodiful moment by talking about her cats. At which point, I am forced to stab her with the cheese knife that I lifted from the table. Putting us both out of our misery.
The best idea for a Christmas night out that my imaginative workmates can come up with is a skittles night. Of course. What better to celebrate the birth of Our Saviour than to take large balls and fling them down some damp-warped alley in an attempt to knock over some woodworm-riddled skittles?
So, for all our sakes – especially Maisie's. Stop asking me to come out.
The full article contains 614 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
