Monday, December 7, 2009

Complaint Box: Office Parties and the Bears in Your Garden
























The small-fry manager said, “As you might be aware, we have been by our Executive Director to organise an ‘employee appreciation luncheon’ on the 16th of December......"

We work like dogs all year long and all we get is a free lunch?! Lady, I can ask MY MOM for a free lunch. Heck lady, even a homeless, jobless drunk can score a free lunch at the soup kitchen. Screw the appreciation lunch; where’s our appreciation bonus?

And the small-fry manager said, “Of course, we’re on a tight budget, due to the global economic crisis. We might need to subsidise the cost of this appreciation lunch with money from our pockets......“

Wait. Stop. Who is appreciating who here? Because if it’s about digging into my own wallet to appreciate myself, why don’t you tell me to go out shopping and buy myself something pretty? I wouldn’t give you people the skin of a grape. Thankyoucomeagain.

“We want our luncheon to have a ......different feel to it; something sophisticated, something impressive, something that has never been done before. Therefore... we have decided that the theme shall be..........are you all ready to find out.......... ‘Garden Party’!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Congratulations. You have achieved the exact opposite of your goals.

“Now, as for the deco. Any suggestions?”

“Oooh, FLOWERS!” said Captain Obvious #1.

“TREEES and GREEN PLANTS!” said Captain Obvious #2

“Scented candles!”

“Pretty birdcages!”

“Lanterns and Fairy Lights!”

“Baskets!”

MANGKUK! I said in my head.

“Butterflies! Real BUTTERFLIES!”

Animals, giraffes, tigers and lions! I continued in my head. And idiots.

“Plastic butterflies!”

“Waterfall!”

Eh?

“You know those mini waterfall things that you can buy from Lillian Too’s World of Feng Shui?”

Ohhh. And also, ugh.

“Oh, oh,oh AND TEDDY BEARS!”

Teddy bears? Teddy bears?!!!!!

“TEDDY BEARS TEDDY BEARS TEDDY BEARS,” the masses chanted.

“Wait, there are bears in your garden?!!!!!!!” I said.

“And.... teddy bears, noted,” said the Small Fry Manager.

“Seriously, why are there bears in your garden?!!!” I said.

“Any objections so far?” asked the Small Fry Manager.

“YES,” I said.

“So no objections, then?”

“I have an objection!” I yelled out.

“Good, no objections,” said the Small Fry Manager, “Let’s get to work then. Box, (that’s me) can you come up with the wording and suggest a few designs for our invitation card?”

“But I have an objection......” I whimpered.

“Can I see something by this afternoon? Try to come up with a nice poem.”

Poem??! I have real, save-the-world-and-milk-it-into-a-press-release-for-good-profit-enhancing-publicity sort of work to do, lady. You want ME to write a POEM for this office party shit? Do you tell Michelangelo to paint a mural for your laundry room? Do you tell Vidal Sassoon to help groom your cat?! Do you ask Annie Leibovitz to snap your passport photo? How dare you! You want a poem? Here’s a poem:

Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
I’d rather be dead,
Than work on this do’.
 
And since you failed to notice my earlier objections, I've incorporated it into the design of our invitation card:
 


I hope you're happy now.

1 comment:

Missa said...

How could I be happy? The bears in your invitation are freaking me out... The second one from the right looks like he's gonna look for me and kill me :(

You should take Dec 16 off!