It has felt like it should be Friday all day. But then that makes sense, considering that the real Friday is bound to be a very short day, and also today marked the beginning of the holiday celebratory festivities. It started with a card on my desk when I got to work, holding a cute card and a gift certificate for a nice restaurant in Sacramento, continued with the pile of homemade chocolate chip cookies brought in by another coworker, and continued on with our office holiday dinner this evening, which was the very best part of the day.

As I mentioned earlier, we're a small office, so going out together for dinner is always a lot of fun, because it isn't too huge a crowd. And this year, even though we are now up to six in the office instead of five, was no exception. There were twelve of us, total, at dinner, which was held at the Slocum House in Fair Oaks - a location a lot further away than most of us had realized (made even further away by the fact that traffic on the few evenings left before Christmas in that direction was nasty). It was raining, so we all came into the restaurant a little damp, hastily wiping water off our gifts and our jackets. But then they ushered us into a room in the back and the rain and the traffic and the time it took to get there just didn't matter any more.

The food was delicious, and there was a lot of it, but the staff spaced everything out so well that my fear of not having any room left for the main course didn't come to pass. The room was just big enough for the twelve of us and secluded enough that we could all hear each other, even at the other end of the table, without shouting. We did a sort of white elephant gift exchange, although there wasn't a single swap or steal because all of us were quite happy with what we ended up with. In fact, amusingly enough, several presents seemed to end up with just the perfect person, as if they were selected for that recipient instead of a gift swap. There were jokes about how it was the most boring white elephant gift exchange ever, but I don't think anyone minded.

And best of all, the entire evening was fun. I am continually aware of how lucky I am to work where I work, and to work with the people i work with, and this dinner was just one more big reminder of that. We were laughing so much our faces hurt by the end of the night. There were hugs goodbye and wishes of Merry Christmas and laughter about driving home in the rain, and it was wonderful.

Tis the season for Holidailies