Christmas Parties

Andy and I both had our work Christmas parties yesterday. Since Andy works in the housing industry and since his company has laid off about 1/3 of its employees over the last year, his Christmas party was scaled way back from its normal grandiose affair. They usually rent out the ballroom of a hotel in the area and have dinner, a professional photographer on hand and entertainment (like Cirqe de Soleil or something). They also invite all the spouses and it's not uncommon to see a whole lot of bling, booze and evening gowns. Because of the cutbacks, they had a mid-day lunch and it was for employees only. I'm not complaining. Ya gotta do what ya gotta do.

For PIN, we had talked about what we wanted to do for a Christmas Party on Monday and ideas were tossed around. I suggested that they all come up to Orange County to attend the Orange County Mormon Choral (OCMC) performance. They all agreed and we arranged to have dinner at the Cheesecake Factory and then to go to the OCMC performance. The OCMC was started this last year by some relatively young brothers (probably about my age) and their objective is to encourage members of the community to seek out uplifting music. I was VERY impressed with the performance. They had several different choirs; the Sunbeam Choir, a children's choir, a youth choir (or two), a women's choir and and adult choir. Some of the songs were accompanied by a small orchestra--which was quite impressive. The kids were mostly cute and their performances sounded more like a recital, but the adult choir was really good! They could have recorded an album for some of the songs they did. I really enjoyed the performance and am contemplating joining next year. Andy, who didn't want to go when I mentioned it to him on Sunday (especially considering he'd have to pay $16+ per ticket) actually enjoyed the performance and was glad he went after all. He even said that if I joined the choir next year, he would come listen to me sing. For now, I'll stick with singing a solo or two in our ward choir.