Roundarch Holiday Party, Take 1


Rumba, River North, Chicago

Last night I went to a Roundarch holiday party that was thrown just for the client team that I’m on. There were about ..hmm… maybe 40 people there, which is about half of the Chicago office.. who all work on projects for this one client.

The party was held at Rumba, a Latin American restaurant, bar and dance club. The party started at 6:00 p.m. but a whole bunch of us left at 5 to get a few extra drinks in. My drink of choice was the capirihna, which was delicious at Rumba, compared to the one I just had at Cafe Bolero last Saturday. We all sat in a private room and got to choose 4 courses from a limited menu. This is what I had:

– Shrimp And Crab Asopao: Shrimp and pulled crab meat, simmered in seafood stock with garlic, ham, tomatoes, green pepper, olives and rice, garnished with cilantro and onions

– Shrimp Caesar’s Salad: Chopped, crispy romaine with tomatoes, Manchego cheese and yucca croutons, served with an orange garlic Caesar’s dressing

– Coconut Plantain Encrusted Sea Bass: 8 oz chilean sea bass. covered with crispy coconut and sweet plantain with a mango-pineapple chutney, served with coconut rice

– Chocolate Luva: Seductive chocolate cake, filled with warm chocolate fudge, served with a rich banana sauce

I liked everything that I had. A lot of people got the filet mignon instead of the sea bass, but I didn’t want something so heavy.

Our client team is so big that I didn’t even have everyone’s names down. I talked a lot with Lulu, who works out of the Boston office and I’d only met at the Roundarch summer event. And with Adam, who I’d only spoken to once briefly in the elevator. And Jaivin who was in town from Boston and does a lot of visual design work for the team. He’s a relatively new homeowner and so am I, so everyone was teasing us for talking about paint and grout and tile. It was nice to have some time outside of work to get to know people together. .. both those you work with daily and those that you don’t know so well.

From our room we could see the main area of the restaurant and bar and see that people were dancing to a live band. Later on a DJ came on and was playing that song they play at weddings. I don’t know what it’s called but it’s like a group dance where the guy is like “Now step to the left, now clap your hands.” There may or may not have been a Roundarch employee dancing to that song.. ahem.. JAMES!… haha. And then that person may or may not have been singing the next song, SexyBack.

A fun night, but I took it easy and left at 10:15 when some people were making their way to another bar. Tonight is our Roundarch company party and on Saturday I’m hosting a party, so I need to pace myself!

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