(diaryland) November 29, 2004 - 10:35 a.m.

I went to possibly the most soul-destroying event EVER. EVER. On Saturday night.

It was Diane's work's Christmas party.

First of all, Diane and I got there early, and I was wearing some ridiculous shit. I was wearing ridiculous shit because it was hot and I had nothing clean to wear that was any good.

Oh, yeah, and the place where the party was was annexed to a gambling/betting joint, which was classy.

OK, so we were there almost an hour early, and we were just sitting at the table, watching the cooks arrange shit on a different, less round table. Diane had waxed her upper lip the night before and it had left an unsightly rash, so I stared at that for a while, and then I couldn't think of anything else to do.

Finally, everybody else came wearing awful shirts and hideous tight-fitting tops, and Bon Jovi was played on the jukebox. Nobody talked to Diane, even though it was her work.

She works in a supermarket. Even though nobody was talking to us, everybody else in the entire place were talking about all the stuff they do in the supermarket. It was infuriating. They were all saying things like, "I did the CIT scan, and Thomas said, NO WAY! I'm PRODUCE! Bwa-hahahaaa!"

Nobody asked me what I did, so then I could proudly say, "I am an extremely lazy and underpaid architect." I didn't want to ask anybody else what they did, because I knew. They worked in a supermarket.

One person actually asked an interesting question at me, which was the highlight of the entire evening. The only problem was that this highlight took place right at the very start of the evening.

Things got a bit better when I made eye contact with the head chef, and he waved at me, so I started a stampede towards the food table. Nobody else was ballsy enough to go first.

I ate a lot, and then I ate everybody else's tiny bread rolls.

OK, so, after that, some lady programmed all the songs she wanted on the jukebox, and then stood around it, not letting anybody pick any of their own. 'Hello Hello' by the Cat Empire got played, and I think I can pinpoint that as the nadir of the night.

So then, I ran off to a place where you exchange notes for coins, and I wasted one dollar on a slot machine. There were dozens of zombies pushing buttons on shiny machines all around me. It was awful, so I went back to the party area.

Then, after dessert, some fool turned up the jukebox until it hurt my tiny ears, so I went outside and sat on a plastic chair looking like I was truly evil. Diane stayed inside and watched a whole bunch of women sing karaoke. She pretended that they were including her in their fun. They sang things like the Grease theme song.

At that point, I decided to bail. I thought I was about to smash somebody's face in. So, I told Diane and then ran away, leaving the supermarket Christmas party to continue on its trajectory further and further into banality.

That party really got me down, man. I thought to myself, "What am I doing with my life?"

So, I drove home angrily, only to find Roland standing sadly on the porch wearing beach attire, a towel slung over his shoulder.

He said, "have you come home to take me to my party?" It was a beach themed party.

I said, "NO," yet I found myself driving almost exactly the way I had just escaped from, except with the added annoyance of having to drive around a police blockade.

So, I dropped Roland off at the party, after terrorising him the entire way, and he went in to see first whether he could get a lift home. He came back out with a person, who I guess was the owner of the party, and she said, "Hi."

I said, "Hi. I'm going now," and then I slammed the door of the car and sped off, which was all very rude and dramatic.

Then I got back home and practiced piano for an hour. It was the only good thing I did that night, except the eating of everybody's tiny bread rolls.

Hey, cool! Diane just rang and said I won a DVD from her Christmas party! Yay!

OK, so the night was not a total, total loss.