The Last Holiday Parties; or, the Column of Misfit Jokes

This is going to be a memorable About Town, if for nothing else because we're writing it in a Starbucks at a train station in Washington DC. The scene is insufferable: clueless tourists, clunky luggage and chatty baristas. We're heading south, and we haven't heard anyone say youse guys in at least two hours.

About Town is out of Hoboken for the next few days, a respite after hitting every holiday shindig everywhere in the city. There was our last week, and our this week. We're so worn from all these late nights that we almost need our forthcoming sober weekend watching Nancy Grace and drinking prune juice with Mom.

Of all the holiday parties we went to this year, the most satisfying one was the one Party With Purpose threw on Tuesday afternoon for the kids of the Boys & Girls Club.

The group throws the party every year, and volunteers on behalf of the club throughout the year. “These kids are the future of our community, and anything we can do for them is our goal,” said Jenifer Sandham, who organized the event.

Gary Greenberg, director of the B&G, praised P with P for its consistency. “This tradition is very important to these kids,” he said.

The group had held a fundraiser a few weeks before at The Madison, which paid for enough pizza to feed over 150 kids. Then Sibel Berberoglu and her Ben & Jerry's crew gave everyone ice cream for dessert.

Every kid also got a toy. Party With Purpose provided all the toys given to kids over age 11, while the Hoboken Rotary gave to the younger kids. All the kids got to take pictures with Santa too.

And the kids got real toys! Footballs to throw and dolls to dress and toy soldiers to march in formation. Toys that inspire imagination and don't need a modem or a memory card.

(Now you see where we got our title - About Town always roots for the Island of Misfit Toys).

That's what made this holiday party we went to so fulfilling - seeing those kids play with their new toys. And they did. It was pandemonium, with kids running around, laughing and smiling. None of those toys cost more than a few bucks, and yet to those kids at that moment each of those toys was worth everything.

The party motivated us the next night when we attended the Hoboken Chamber of Commerce's holiday party at the Elks Lodge, which was also a toy drive. About Town looked to donate our old standard, Princess Pony, but the drugstore was sold out, so we bought a miniature doll house, one with tiny figurines of a boy and a girl and pieces to put in a living room, bedroom and kitchen. But no bathroom (outhouse sold separately?).

There About Town saw Rotarians and or Chamber members Ryan Mitchell, Christopher Mackin, Richard Mackiewicz and Joe Mindak, plus Hoboken Public Library trustee Arturo Martinez. Oh, and Elizabeth Barry too. They let her in despite not having a last name that ends in an M.

Zabrina Stoffel came by with her young kids. “Are you Santa,” Mindak asked Stoffel's daughter. “No, my brother is,” the little girl said, to which her brother bellowed a hearty “ho, ho, ho.”

Stoffel was there to accept her third place prize in the Chamber's first ever . The Chamber gave cash prizes to the three homes in the city best decorated in the holiday spirit. When the Chamber told Stoffel what she had won she donated the amount by buying extra toys.

The Chamber also awarded winners in a business category, which included third place , and first place home décor store . As the first place store, Michelangela also won a bonus of several thousand dollars worth of free advertising in local media.

Good for them. We don't know much about what else happened because About Town actually left this party early. We were already pooped and had to get ready to travel the next day.

We're traveling today. It's been a slog, taking a subway to New York, to standing an hour waiting to board a bus, to riding the bus for hours to DC and now waiting for a train to Richmond. But we guess this Starbucks isn't so bad. They've got nice Christmas music playing – that Charlie Brown song, and our favorite, the Little Drummer Boy. And thinking about how a lot of people did give a lot in this season of giving has put us in a good mood. Whatever you celebrate, About Town wishes you a very happy holiday.

Alan Skontra was a big dork who never went anywhere. Then he started writing the About Town column for Patch, and now he's everywhere. Have a hot tip on an event in Hoboken? Send an invitation, questions and comments too, to alanskontra@hotmail.com, and peep his tweets @alanskontra.