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Curious - why couldn't you leave earlier? "Hidden" social consequences?
I've yet to attend a company party that I found to be "super fun". They're always somewhat cringey and it's rare that a company is actually making serious effort to give employees a good time.
It's mostly just a weird semi-forced networking/socialization get-together. Unless the company's going all out on it and I'm interested on a personal level, I personally couldn't give two shits whether if my lack of attendance is noticed or not. I have better things to do with my time and I recommend for most people to treat this the same way. -
I’ve been to a good company party, it as an anniversary, but I didn’t enjoy it at all.
- drinks were extra loaded with alcohol to the point you could not feel the taste (and I like tastes and dislike alcohol)
- people danced a lot and made fun of themselves, but since there were managers it felt risky to do so
- lots of randos I didn’t know, it felt pain inducing
I think parties are just a bad idea for a good share of devs, accountants and artists (50/50 in this case) as we tend to be introverts.
So... This is something that happened some time ago.
I went to my company's end-of-year celebration party. Since I've done mostly contractor stuff, I didn't really know anyone and thought this'd be a good chance to meet my peers.
My coworkers ended up being mostly HR people, and I couldn't find even one person with common interests.
It was a 2 hour bus ride away, and I had to stay over at a friend's place for the night, but that wasn't bad.
The party itself well...it started at 7pm and ended at... 4 am During that time I just wanted to be somewhere else. I felt alienated and out of place. I couldn't even play phone games since I had lost my phone the day prior.
The one conversation I had was forced upon me by a smug bastard who probably worked at HR or management. Wanted me to agree with him on something while I just wanted to go drink alone. He kept redefining words and moving goal posts every time I disagreed.
Most of the "party" was people 10-20 years older than me dancing to music I hadn't heard since I was in middle school.
The food was bad and sparse. The drinks... not even good either. Cheap pub drinks. No decent mixes.
To top it all off I couldn't leave early.
Just felt like ranting about this
rant
office party