Jerseygirl

Why you are from San Diego...summer all year round there!

Siouxie

The Keg Steak House venues put on a christmas do for their staff every year, a big booze up, much frivolity! Many restaurants in my area are packed at Christmas with 'office parties' -- they tend to be a bit more formal here I think, meals out rather than the big p*** up we were used to in the UK.. I only worked for a couple of places in the UK that had parties, one was me, my assistant, an engineer and the 2 owners sat on the floor with several bottles of spirits and packets of crisps, LOL. Going to the pub with some of your work mates (nothing official) was more the thing in my day

Former Lancastrian

Don't you have to be insane to live or admit to living in Winnipeg

spouse of scouse

That's why most of us spend Christmas either in the air conditioning or in the pool/ocean It's far more common here to have a cold Christmas dinner too, although I bow to tradition some years and do the full roast thing. I'm having scouse's kids over for dinner Christmas Eve, we're having prawn and avocado cocktails then a (cold) glazed baked ham with various salads. Trifle for dessert, although I'll get a small plum pudding for the Pom to have with custard.

Christmas will be at my brother's house because he has a pool big enough to fit us all in

scrubbedexpat091

More mindset, winter in San Diego is still cooler than summer, and the local mountains can have snow making for pretty backdrop.

I had some trouble finding a more recent picture on the interwebs so the skyline has changed a bit, but gives an idea of what winter is like there.....





Los Angeles has taller mountains.

scrubbedexpat091

I spent an hour once in Winnipeg, even took a picture. I will probably never return. Spent even less time in Saskatoon, but it was 2am, was only there for 10 minutes, maybe less.

Rete

The company Christmas party = works Christmas do.

Our firm always had a large Christmas party offsite with food, music, dancing and drinks. I never went. Just a bunch of co-workers and bosses acting like arses.

Paul_Shepherd

Maybe its just engineering/manufacturing companies in Canada that don't do it anymore, (they used to years ago so I hear) I have heard of office parties here being more meal based rather than a "lash-up" , but the companies I have worked for don't do anything. Last year 4-5 of us just got the train into Toronto and did our own thing.

Some of the Christmas parties we used to have in the UK were great times.....legendary! so many great laughs, we used to finish at 1pm and everyone in the company would pile down to the pub!

One company used to put on on a full high end dinner dance with a band the lot, and...... put you up in the hotel for the night!!....they were good times too! ah...Halcyon days.

scrubbedexpat091

I could see why it would be more common in Keg like workplaces, after all the booze and food is at cost and have a suitable building already, so probably pretty inexpensive overall to boost employee morale, where other companies in other industries wont have access to at cost booze and food, and seems the trend these days is to lower morale as low as possible in some workplaces.

caretaker

Lots of them rent some place else for their parties too. Normally we host around 6 - 8 Christmas parties and cabarets and some of them are for restaurants, and some of them do real good business.

scrubbedexpat091

Yes forgot about that during Christmas, a good money maker for hotels and restaurants.

All the hotels I ever worked in even the Day's Inn would be booked solid mid November to New Years Eve for parties, in December especially many nights more revenue from banquet department than rooms.

Upside to being night audit, get to see all the revenue, and non-cash tips the banquet people make and how much the electric bill is the 140 room Best Western would average like 3,000 a month for hydro, can only imagine what the big hotels in Vancouver and Whistler pay just in electricity each month.

Not so much now as many chains have pulled porn from their rooms, but back in the day everyone thinking it was some hidden secret, I know what you were watching last night, exact time, title and even how long you watched it for....

Jerseygirl

Yes cooler..but warm by most people’s standard.

I have been to LA many times, but I’ve only been to SD once. Loved it and will go back one day. Yes the scenery is fabulous.

scrubbedexpat091

LA is too big and spread out for me, never been a fan, but a lot of people in SD don't care for LA...so it's not unusual...ha ha

SD is also more compact and easier to get place to place, Mexico to the south, ocean to the west, mountains to the east and Camp Pendleton to the North, ensures SD can't turn into another LA, simple not enough land. Camp Pendleton is a savior really, without it, SD/Orange County/LA would just be one giant mega blob. Add in a bunch of the other random military bases in the area and there is a fair amount of land that can't be built on/developed so while not accessible to the public, it also prevents the land from being turned into more houses and strip malls.

And San Diego has a quaint easy to get in and out airport located a mere 3 miles from downtown, also busiest single runway airport in the US, and I believe 3rd busiest single runway airport in the world, with Mumbai and Gatwick being busier, so when BA flew San Diego to Gatwick they had service between the busiest single runway airport on each end, but they switched to Heathrow and during COVID no idea if they are even flying the route.

Balboa Park is also awesome, and only a few minutes from downtown, home to the SD Zoo which of course is world famous for its research and conservation and helping keep species from going extinct, but in addition to the zoo there are like 20 museums in the park, most of which offer 1 day free each month to residents plus the botanical gardens, so much to do there....

It's probably why I get so bored in BC, I had more to do in just 1 park there......

scrubbedexpat091

And don't forget Santa and his reindeer

HGerchikov

When I started work in the mid 1980s - this was known as Friday. When it came around to Christmas - we didn't bother with the pub but food and a ridiculous amount of drink was brought into the office past the police guards who would stand with their eyes shut and fingers in their ears so they couldn't see the bottles or hear them chinking. That changed a lot by the time I left in 2004 with no official recognition of the holidays at all. The company in Toronto used to have great annual parties including open bar, but after a couple of takeovers those stopped happening to the same extent. When I moved into Real Estate - my first brokerage which was a Remax franchise held some pretty swanky parties - again open bar (but given that everyone paid them $900 per month for the privilege of working there they could afford it).