It's THAT TIME again

Dear !ERROR,

It is with great pleasure that I enclose your e-ticket to the YOU KNOW WHAT annual gala. This year has just flown by, and we are very excited to see you and your additional party of 1 for an evening of networking, sitting up straight, gentle clapping, fine food, THE ENCOUNTER, and a great set of live music from the Caspar David Friedrich Ukelele Ensemble. We hope you are as excited as we are.

Please note that there will be a few small changes from last year in order to avoid any unpleasantness between descendants of the Huguenots and those who claim affiliation with their traditional enemies the Bourbon Royal family. The reception will now begin at 6:15 in the Torquemada Cocktail Room – religious iconography will be prohibited except for the following benign items:

• Small crosses
• Stars of David
• Unibrows
• Forever 21 sweatshirts
• The Black Calf
• Plastic pirate eye-patches
• Wu-Wear

After the cocktail hour and fifteen minutes, dinner will be served in the Charles Hoy Fort room, presumably on tables, though one can never be certain. A vegetarian option is always a possibility, though I personally wouldn’t depend on it. Bringing emergency celery in your purse is prohibited as foreign dignitaries may be present and must not be exposed to questionable agri-products.

FUN TIP NO. 1: SMART ATTENDEES DO NOT EAT THE PARSLEY.

After dinner, potentiality will reign. A solid two and a half hours are booked in which activities have the strong possibility of occurring. Awards may or may not be presented to entrepreneurs who may or may not be deserving of them. There may be applause. There may be deathly silence. There may be witty banter from an MC whom everybody recognizes but nobody remembers for certain. If you have children, you may forget about them.

FUN TIP NO 2.: SMART ATTENDEES WEAR BUSINESS ATTIRE. FOR YOUR OWN SAFETY MAKE SURE "THE PIN" IS VISIBLE. 

It is at this point that I would like to remind all attendees that there is nothing funny about a person in an ill-fitting camel fur blazer who stutters and sweats profusely on-stage while enumerating various wrongs done to his unrecognized middle eastern nation by imperialist powers. A fellow like that may be responsible for announcing certain awards in the “Best Light Fixture – Eastern Bracket” category.  Laughing at such people, even under one’s breath, even in one’s mind, is considered very gauche. It would besmirch our organization’s very generalized, none-too committed foundational principles outlined in the Terms of Reference if such a trespass should occur this year. Hostages have nothing to do with this situation, nor do strained peace negotiations. Really, it’s just being polite. You haven’t been warned.

And so, before I start rambling on about how excited we all are, what things we will achieve, what cosmic planes of existence we will cross and counter-cross in accordance with the sensitivity of our in-house shaman, I will end this email, and, in accordance with DIRECTIVE 34a, wish you a happy gala evening.