Christmas Office Party-ughh!

[Gobbler]

Our small military medical clinic had our annual xmas party yesterday which overall was pretty fun and we had some good food catered in. This is the first one I've had here with this particular staff since I've only worked here six months. Almost everyone knows I'm an atheist and they know I'm a ex-c. Pretty much the whole staff is christian of one stripe or another, some fundier than others. Prior to the party starting there were a few of us milling around up front by the waiting area where the xmas tree was set up and we begin making small talk. So I ask if anyone knows where the xmas tree originated from. No one says anything for certain so I tell them Germany. We start talking about xmas in general and I just blurt out, "You know xmas has nothing to do with jesus." Since the hardcore fundies were not in the room no one said anything countering that. Well we all start to gather and before we eat we are asked to bow our heads to pray for the meal. It is a given everyone believes in the sky daddy. I for one did not bow my head or even close my eyes. I just looked around and everyone else had their heads bowed in solemn prayer. No one noticed my non-conformity. Didn't even say amen either!

That part didn't really bother me though, let them have their rituals because no one will ever force me to pray again! So after the meal we have a Chinese gift exchange. You draw numbers and pick out your present, the limit was twenty bucks to spend on a gift. If you pick a gift and don't want it you can exchange it with a person who had already picked a gift. It can be quite fun watching people manuever for that right gift. So anyway it comes my turn and I pick out a gift. Unwrap it in front of everyone and everyone kinda snickers and makes fun of it. It is a snowman globe with a tea lamp on top. It also came along with "Sonoma Diet" book. I say great just what I need! So I decide to keep this gift because I don't want to ruin anyone else's fun. In retrospect I should have chosen my own gift card I bought at Borders. So after the party is over one of the junior enlisted guys asks to exchange with me. I ask why because I was going to put the damn globe on my desk for decoration. He says he wants the globe for his house so I exchange with him for his putting golf green, the kind you put on the floor to practice putting. I don't golf but he was insistent to exchange the gift.

The next morning he tells me that the globe was a gag gift and the one who got it was supposed to be allowed to exchange it at the end. He also informed me the lady who brought this gag gift was the resident super fundy and she had gotten this gift last year! The book was old too! At this point I was a little miffed that the resident super christian lady who puts out little Gideon bibles in the waiting area and other silly christian propaganda would pull such a stunt and not even tell me! She knows I'm an atheist too. Everyone else spends twenty bucks for decent gifts and she uses ones from last year. And the globe was broken too come to find out! There were only a few junior enlisted people in the office at the time so I said at least it wasn't a goddamned bible! They kind of smirked at that. And I also said it was funny how the the resident born-again christian was the one to pull this bullshit! They actually agreed with me and the guy who exchanged the gift with me was miffed too and he said he had already let her know and he said she wasn't even probably going to tell me. Which I know she wouldn't. I bet the holy spirit told her to do this! BTW, anytime I come across her propaganda in the waiting areas I immediately get rid of it!

[SWIM]

We do a thing now an then with the in-laws called "dirty santa" where you can force swap gifts. Kinda interesting, ussually fun, but I can see how it would suck in a room full of xtians. Oh my inlaws are mostly xtain, but not hardcore, and it seldom enters conversations or actions.