Matthew
| 
Sunday 07 Dec 08, 12:27PM
So the Christmas office party season is about to begin and we had ours on Friday. You always go to the parties with the intention of not talking 'shop' but you end up getting involved in gossip and slagging off a few people. I think I lasted 5 minutes at mine before the conversation was directed around who doesn't get on with who.
You also get to hear about who fancies who. I got told that a 40-something has a crush on me. What happened to the 20-somethings liking me? And to cap it off the person that told me said this 40 year old had 'only seen me from a distance'. I really must have a few more wrinkles than I thought. Maybe I should start thinking about visiting the Bride of Wildenstein's surgeon. Anyway, I was more interested in my dinner than gossiping at mine. The soup for starters was lovely but the turkey was awful. The largest thing on my plate was the three brussell sprouts. Shella claims that in the middle of the night I guffed twice which woke her up but I'm in denial of this, especially as I left the sprouts.
Mum cutting the turkey at Christmas 2007
So I wake up with a hangover which isn't good when you have to play football against players now about 15 years younger than yourself. Needless to say I was rubbish and was brought off with 20 minutes to go.
I can remember at my previous job they used to hold the Christmas party at the end of January and call it a 'New Years party' as it was cheaper to hire the venue then, but there used to be some strange items left behind by people. We'd get an email on the Monday with a list of items - coats, handbags, wallets etc but the most amusing was the 'one shoe' someone had left behind. I mean, how do you forget one solitary shoe?
The worst Christmas party I've ever been to must be one I went to at Marwell when Shella and I first got together. At the time I had very long hair and used to dry it in a big buffon that wouldn't have looked out of place in an 80's band like Kiss, Motley Crue or Europe. A drunken colleague came up to me and said "I must say Matt you really look like a girl". I'd not heard a comment like this since my first day at primary school when I was 4 and Mrs Milne asked me if I was Tara Smith (a girl starting on the same day with the same long blonde hair as me). Anyway, I was fuming after that comment and we rarely spoke again for the next 6 years I worked for the company.
Shella says I'm like an elephant and never forget arguments but whats the point in arguing if you are supposed to forget about it later?
I've had a couple of petty arguments over the years with good friends, the pettiest must be when I lived with Usher Matt and we were watching Neighbours and we argued over what Lucy's real name was. I said it was Melissa Bell whilst Matt said it was Melissa Ball. When the end credits came up and I was right I think I threw a triumphant fist in the air and we ended up not speaking for a week!
Christmas 1985 in the Storey household
Another falling out I had was with Usher Ashley when we went camping for the weekend at Sandy Balls Holiday Centre in the New Forest when we were 15. Ash spent all his money on the first day on the fruit machines then asked to borrow some off me. He then spent that and an argument erupted and we didn't speak for the whole weekend even though we were sharing a two man tent!
And so with Christmas only two and a half weeks away lets hope it's argument free for me. Shella's going to very kindly get me an iPhone for Christmas which being a gadget man I'm pretty excited about. I guess when you were a kid the excitment was always multiplied. How can I ever top the level of excitement I felt when I knew I was getting the Evel Knievel stunt set for Christmas at the age of about 8? I remember slowly realising Father Christmas didn't exist and my mum still leaving out some sherry by my bed for him, which I then hid in my drawer for a few weeks after. I think I was trying to double bluff my mum into thinking Santa had drunk it.
Does anyone remember the Christmas number one in 1985? It was Shakin' Stevens with Merry Christmas Everyone. I can vividly remember helping Ashley on his paper round singing that song loudly over and over all the way round.
Bloody cool kids we were!
