It’s office Christmas party time again, that traditional chance to let your hair down and relax in a consequence-free, non-judgmental environment.
Yeah, right. Christmas parties are of course a riot of disgust as your colleagues reveal their true, highly dysfunctional selves — and you realise with dawning horror that your career is in the hands of total morons.
As such, here are some of the types you may encounter, and should probably stay clear of, this year.
The Biohacker
Why is it only the worst people in the world who want to live for ever? If the planet is destined to be inherited by this bunch of joyless, vampiric, pedantic, arch-narcissists, then euthanise me at 50, please.
The biohackers are a new breed at office parties this year, marked by not just their refusal to drink or eat, but by their withering assessment of everything that you eat and drink. “Do you know how ultra-processed gravy is?” they’ll say pityingly, from their spheres of enlightenment. What you put on your body will come next: "You use deodorant? And toothpaste? Well, you’re playing footsie with cancer, and putting money in the pocket of Big Pharma". The words Big Pharma are a mantra for these people, spat out every five seconds in between bites of grains from their metal lunch tin, repeated almost as much as the words: "the bloody NHS".
Apparently, the only hope for us poor dying saps is to watch their over-privileged little rich boy musings on those terribly ethical social media platforms. Anyway, the only merciful thing at the party is that the biohackers have to leave early to make sure they’re in bed and hooked up to an IV drip by 7.30pm. This is despite them having spent all evening dodging prosecco as if it were liquified bacon.
The Conspiracy Theorist
Since lockdown, Brian has developed a facial tic and an addiction to right-wing loons on YouTube. Brian is now convinced that Covid was a hoax, the government is a hoax, old people are a hoax and the entire lunch is a hoax, too. He will mutter mysteriously about celebrities being cancelled because they know too much. And darkly, that he himself will soon be silenced too. That said, his knowledge of Top 40 hits in the 80s makes him invaluable for your quiz team.
The TikTok Influencer
Whereas last year, the Social Media Influencer was in perma-record mode, live-streaming their entire night, this year’s TikTok-ers don’t have the attention span for such long-form (over-60s) pursuits. No, they’re into ‘capturing’ minute details in which everything that happens in life is a hashtag. #sayinghello #sittingdown #herecomesthefood #conversationtime. Also, the pranksters of the night expect their sub-You’ve Been Framed fodder to include telegraphed pratfalls, beer mat flipping and genuinely dangerous William Tell darts. Yes, the lad mag days are back, only this time they're not just the preserve of male working-class impersonators. Now all genders, races and cultures can participate in being absolute dickheads.
The Secret Millionaire
It turns out the office junior is landed gentry. Spaffy spends her whole time moaning about her lack of money, even though her cab budget alone for the month beats your entire wages. Of course, she’s like this because she feels terribly poor compared with her insanely rich friends and older siblings, who are so wealthy they’re essentially a different species. Spaffy doesn’t enjoy herself and can’t seem to see what the Christmas fuss is about, given that she’s out at a party every night and gifts rain on her like, well, rain. Mind you, she does dish out the drugs.
The Secret Breadline Survivor
In contrast, for this junior member of the team, the Xmas dinner has a different appeal: sustenance. Toni will eat a metric tonne of turkey since they haven’t eaten a full meal in weeks. The cost of living kicked them to the gutter, and they can’t even afford the rent there. Will go on to as many bars as possible, not to cadge drinks, but simply to keep warm.
The Drunk Boss
You can tell how well your company is doing by watching your boss at the party. If they stay sober and leave early, the company is fine: they don’t want to ruin their good fortune by doing something regretful. If your boss gets roaring drunk and is out all night: your company will close before the new year. Expect a lot of drunk bosses this time around and if you can see past your own impending career doom, they’ll be very entertaining company and reveal an unexpected past as a cruise ship singer or a dominatrix. In six months' time, they’ll be running a biohacker retreat in Costa Rica.
The Scrapper
Colin is a mild-mannered, stable man with geeky tastes and as he’s become older, he’s become crushingly aware of it. All this past year he’s been obsessed with MMA and has been working on his body to the degree that he is suddenly a one-man killing machine – and keen to show it.
The Christmas party is his chance, where his shirt is destined to come off: firstly on the dancefloor, where all the girls gaze in alarm at the Godzilla (1954 version) tattoo adorning his traps and lats; and secondly, outside the pub, where he tries to kick in the heads of the entire staff of HSBC who are having their own party next door. Will end the evening either sacked, or promoted, depending on the gender of his onlooking line manager.
The Authentic Accountant
Milo has tattoos of Blink 182 on his calves, a Peaky Blinkers cap on his head, shouts "I need a Guinness" every five seconds in an Irish-American accent (even though he’s from Bracknell), and complains about the inauthentic chain bar you’re in until he drags everyone to an authentically shit old man’s boozer.
His sense of humour consists of recounting gags from 00s sitcoms. Was recently dumped by his girlfriend, which he is actually delighted about, as he thinks the heartbreak might give him the gravitas he’s been searching for, the kind of trauma his loving parents failed to deliver and for which he’ll never forgive them.
The Shot-Obsessed Doomed Party Animal
One person is always obsessed with shots. That person is Paris and she seems to have forgotten all about last year when she vomited in her own shoes. Once again she’s intent on bringing the party from the off, even if no one wants the party to start at all.
Before you can even make your first pull-a-cracker ‘joke’, she’s bringing over trays of tequila. When Will, the mid-level manager in the too-tight polo neck shakes his beetroot head to decline, Paris will happily do the shot for him. And for any of the other ‘woke babies’ too. Needless to say, Paris’ night will end with vomiting into shoes again — this time, someone else’s.
The Middle-Aged Male Taylor Swift Fan
Wearing a T-shirt with ‘This is what a feminist looks like’ on it, Seb is mortified about his previous incarnation as an Ibiza-with-the-lads body count-obsessed braying jock. In middle age, he is now recasting himself as a groovy father figure who is down with Gen Z’s beliefs. Principally, this means he has become an expert on Taylor Swift and turns every conversation inexorably back to her.
Detested by his wife, he hopes to be rescued from his marriage by a young, ‘like-minded’ lady, the fantasy of which is inherently tied up in his Swift fandom. At some point, he will try to enter the women’s toilets but will later claim he was just drunk and looking for his coat. And his exposed penis was due to a ‘wardrobe malfunction’.
