Bizness Lunch

I went to a luncheon today. For work. Yes, I do manage to hold down a job, though you'd never guess from my behavior at these things. No amount of free food is worth the pure psychological and arm-pitular torture these things put me through. They make me nervous, and, worse, they make me very aware that I cannot be trusted to interact with other people like a normal, professional adult.
Everyone at a business luncheon is supposed to be schmoozing, getting people really stoked about this great new thing their company is doing.
I don’t do this. I never know anybody at "industry events." I barely know what “schmoozing” is -- according to my Word program, I don’t even know how to spell it. I'm 22 years old. I haven’t even been in the work force for a year. I know my parents, people I went to college with and my roommate. I don't even know everyone in my own office.
Luncheons, as translated through my non-business-person mind, are very similar to one of those high-school-misfit-gets-picked-on-then-makes-good-in-the-end movies, only there is no crowning of the homecoming court at luncheons. It’s one of their many flaws.
You (the misfit, of course) show up at a party and none of the cool kids who invited you are there, just weird kids you don't know. The cool kids hang around in the shrubbery long enough to see the complete shock and dejection on your face and then scamper off to their own cool-kid party, where there might be some beer and people will probably get to make out with each other.
In the luncheon situation, my boss, who tells me, “Oh, you should go, what a great opportunity!” but who would never attend such a thing herself, is the cool kid. She definitely looks like she would lurk around in someone’s azaleas for a laugh.
Just like every true nerd party, luncheons do not encourage any false sociability brought on by booze (flaw number 2). They make foolish excuses for such disappointments, like, “You have to go back to work after this, and we don’t want you passing out in front of your boss again,” or, “The cheap tables we have set up cannot support someone dancing on them,” or, “This particular luncheon takes place at 11 in the morning, and, in some circles, drinking at 11 AM on a Wednesday in front of your professional peers is frowned upon.” But, as the slow-blossoming seed of a can-do business lady, I don’t like excuses, I don’t take no for an answer and I DO like a good bloody mary.
When I got to this little shindig, and there was no bar to hang out at, I was at a loss. So I did what any really professional person would do and hid in the bathroom (after walking in on another lady in there and then forgetting to give her my card).
I spent about 10 minutes more pretending to rummage around in my purse for some very important documents and checking my phone for all the very important phone calls I was missing by deigning to be here with these people. Really, I was just standing over my purse in the corner with my head down, waving my hands about every so often, but I thought that if I looked serious enough, I could probably fool people. I furrowed my brow.
When that 10 minutes was up, I still had about 45 to burn. A true innovator, I poured a Coke into a wine glass, hoping for some sort of placebo effect that would make me as charming and witty as I KNOW I certainly must be when I have been drinking. I did my best to chat people up -- which means I stumbled into groups of people who were obviously enjoying pleasant conversations, muttered some words about my job and threw my business cards at them, all while blushing and stuttering and sweating up a storm.
I looked like I was a really bad liar trying to pull something over on them – “No, you caught me, I’m not a journalist at all, I’m just using your strategic business input for my own nefarious schemes. Blast you!”
Thankfully, no one caught on.