Work.Retire.Die.

It’s the official last day of real work for the year and 90% of the emails you’ll send today will be some variation of ‘Looks good! If we don’t connect next week, have a great holiday!’ In a normal year, this would be prime office holiday party night and corporate hacks like yourself would be gearing up to face a night of small talk, open bars, and potentially career ruining drunken decisions. That’s not happening this year and it’s a goddam shame – I love office holiday parties more than pretty much anything in the world. Here’s what I’ll miss the most about them this year.

RIP HOliday Parties: Remembering the Best Parts of In-Person Office Celebrations

5. The Appetizers

COVID has taken many things from us, but none more so than a good solid cocktail party appetizer. The kind of food that’s good, but there’s absolutely no world in which you are cooking it or ordering it from Seamless. If it’s not right in front of you, you’re just not going to have 3-4 lukewarm sliders, I’m sorry.

OFFICIAL COCKTAIL PARTY APPETIZER POWER RANKING:

7. Veggies with ranch dressing – fuck vegetables. Also, I can buy them at the grocery story if I want them.

6. Charcuterie with cracker and cheese – very hard to eat in a social setting. One of those foods that is too big for 1 bite, but too small for 2.

5. Meat Sticks (also known as Shish Kebab) – delicious but also hard to eat. Sometimes the meat is very dry too. Stinky!

4. Buffalo Wings – don’t you tempt me with wings at a holiday party. I will eat a dozen and have sauce all over my face. 

3. Shrimp Cocktail – very hard to find bad shrimp, but when you do it is gross. 

2. Tuna Tartare – on a cracker? Are you kidding me? Basically cooked sushi. 

1. Pigs in a mf blanket – this is acceptable, fancy kid’s food. 

4. Day of the Holiday Party

Most places will do the holiday party right after the workday so people actually show up. The day is pretty low-key from a work perspective; maybe there’s a mad dash around 3 or 4 to tie up some loose ends before the holiday, but usually everything is pretty much squared away for the rest of the year.

Once people start wrapping up work, there’s a fun little period before the party starts where everyone goes off to get all fancy and shit for the night ahead. People start drinking a little bit, everyone’s dressed up and looking as hot as you’ve ever seen them, and there’s a sort of nervous excitement about the upcoming party. It’s kinda like the homecoming dance in high school.

This is your one chance to make a move on that cute girl who sits three rows over who you’ve never actually talked to. Are you going to make out with your crush tonight? Probably not. Will you start to overthink it, start pounding booze because you’re nervous, and then not speak to her until it’s winding down and you grunt something weird at her and she looks at you in horror? Of course. Because that’s what real white-collar gangstas do.

3. Dressing Up and Looking Good

I have worn sweatpants and a sweatshirt for 80% of my outfits since March. Yes, they’re WRD merch so it’s fucking sick. But, I do miss actually shaving and putting on a nice suit with shoes and stuff. It’s fun to look hot sometimes.

2. The Day After the Holiday Party

Don’t be a little bitch and work from home the day after the holiday party. Chug some water, have a coffee, and drag yourself into the office because this is one of the best parts of the year. There’s nothing better than commiserating about how hungover you are with your coworkers while sharing stories from the night before. Who left with who? Which VP had way too many? Wait, that guy I was talking to is the CFO??

If you followed our golden rule for office drinking, you were the 4th drunkest last night – drunk enough to have fun, but not so much that you’re the story of the office. Even if you ended up being the drunkest girl at the party, you need to show your face the next day. It’s better to face the horrible things you’ve done than have everyone talk shit about you.

1. Randomly Becoming Friends with Someone

Outside of appetizers, this is the worst thing that COVID has taken from Corporate America. I get it – working from home rules. You save hours from not having to commute or put on real pants and you realize you can do 90% of your job from your couch. But it just…gets old and you miss those little moments the office that make work fun. Walking to meetings, sitting at the lunch table, making faces to each other on a conference call. When you’re working from home, you don’t Slack your coworker just to say hi. You don’t hang around after a Zoom call like you would in a conference room. You just end the meeting and go back to whatever Excel sheet you were working on.

On the same vein, you completely miss out on the best part of any holiday party if you’re virtual – randomly becoming best friends with someone you’ve never spoken to be. Maybe you run into a guy who works on another floor at the bar. Maybe you have a few and finally get the courage to approach that really cool looking person who wears like leather jackets and stuff. Maybe you and a coworker both realize you hate the same person and make fun of them for 3 hours. This is prime time for getting drunk and realizing that some of your coworkers are actually cool and establishing a happy hour crew.