Oh the SHAME!!!

Okay. Yesterday I left the office early to go on a drinking fest with my department. Don't you just love a country that encourages you to "bond" with your workmates by copious amounts of alcohol?!! There wasn't even a need to claim "tummy flu" or "migrane"! The afternoon (which I count as anything after 12pm and before 12AM in this instance) of libation indulgence was sanctioned and also paid for entirely by my company! Finland - the land of opportunity and "networking" thru slurred speach and really hot rooms where you sweat your pahtooty off while somone pours a ladle full of water on rocks which are so hot they could sear the skin off your bones... makes sense to the Finns and who am I to rock the boat when there is free booze and food!

This "team building" event was out in a place called Marskin Maja. I could give you the whole history lesson on who Mannherheim was but that would bore you and you would be drooling and snoring before you finished reading any of it so I won't. It was a lovely location in the middle of nowhere about 1 1/2 hours from Helsinki. Very nice place with saunas and a beautiful lake and 70 of my co-workers.

They had all these activites planned. The invitation stated: "Remember the proper equipment: shoes, clothes ". I was a bit concerned at this reminder. Does this mean that people are going to show naked? Shoes and clothes...what if I was a nudist? But I digress...no shock there.. Right activities.. Okay so there were 5 different things which everyone was "encouraged" (Read: required) to do. One event was a 3 part brain challenge thing which involved crossing an imaginary swamp with 4 pieces of long wood and 5 small wooden blocks with all 5 of your team members standing on the wood at the same time and having to pass forward the last "log" to the front and inch forward a board at a time to the other side while balancing on your makeshift balance beam. Part 2 was a bottle which had 8 strings attached to it -4 at the neck and 4 at the bottom - threaded through this wooden box frame at each corner (2 in each corner for the mathmatically impaired). There were 2 mugs in opposite corners of the box frame. The object: once you lift the bottle from the ground it can not touch again and you must fill BOTH mugs to the top in under 8 minutes. Part 3 was moving a stack of tires (arranged in pyramid form with the biggest on the bottom) from around 1 pole to a second pole. There is a 3rd pole which can help you move them since no 2 tires can be "in motion at the same time" and no larger tire can be on top of a smaller tire...get the idea?..it is much easier to show you how to do it..but this being the web and all..use your imagination.

I actually enjoyed those 3 activities. There was also moutain biking, learning how to use a kick bike - in essence a scooter for adults without the motor -, canoeing and then the last "activity". At this point in the afternoon I am wondering: 1.) where is the booze damn it! 2.) I didn't sign up for things that make me sweat. 3.) Where is the booze?!

"To the SHAME James and step on it!"... I actually had to do something I swore I would never do. Nordic Walking. HOLY HELL is that stuff embarassing. You are probably thinking to your self "nordic walking?..do Scandinavians walk in some odd way that other humans don't?"... Folks..they do it with ski poles! I am not joking. It is entirely shameful and embarassing. Not only because you look like a right twit and only OLD people do it, but because if you have the co-ordination of a cow like I do..you can't even do it PROPERLY!!! OH the opprobrium!!! <-word of the day

Thank goodness for the copious amounts of alcohol after that. Little did I know I had to debase myself before I could drink. Now I have to nurse my hangover. Bright spot: K and D arrive in 11 hours for a weekend sans goose liposcution and free of shitty Californian wine. :)