The B'day Cake Dilemma

Disclaimer: This is a fictitious piece of work. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. (Yeah right!)  

 

A company A-soles has a policy of celebrating birthdays of its employees. Every department maintains a "birthday list" of their own members and organizes a celebration. Like every month, this March, Dept. X sent out an internal invitation to everyone working there to celebrate birthdays of the "March boys" - employees who's birthdays fell in March. Ms. Lisa was especially excited to get the invitation for several reasons:

1. She loved birthday parties
   
2. She was new in the company and this would be a nice occasion to meet everyone in the dept.
   
3. That sounded like the only exciting thing in the whole boring company 
   
   "Wow! Does this mean they'd celebrate my birthday next month? I'd be an April girl you know", Lisa said to her colleague Dick. Dick felt trapped. You see, Lisa wasn't a regular employee of A-soles but sent on behalf of their promoters. Dick wasn't sure if she was officially entitled to a birthday party. "I love chocolate cakes" winked Lisa, hinting her preference to Dick. Dick's spirits sank lower because he knew she was counting on him for getting the dept. to celebrate her b'day next month.
   
   A worried Dick informed Tom, the department's unofficial birthday organizer about Lisa's birthday. "We can't ignore her birthday", said Dick. Obviously he didn't want to jeopardize his job. Actually, Dick wasn't even sure if offending Lisa would hurt his own career, since he didn't exactly know what her profile was at the promoters' and if she had the power enough to influence anyone's career at A-soles. No one at S-soles knew, but then no one wanted to take any chances. 
   
   Tom scratched his 2nd chin, wondering what to do. "I'll look into the matter", he said, more out of sheer habit than genuine intention. But Lisa's perceived authority worried him too. So he sat at his computer, opening out the Birthdays.xls file that he had created. He was especially proud of this file as he had written the Macros himself. As he entered Lisa's name and birth date, the form asked for her employee code and employee grade. Tom entered N/A but the form wouldn't work because obviously Tom hadn't thought anyone outside the dept. would ever be having a celebration there. As Tom tried to tweak around the form, he realized his brilliant piece of work was screwing him back. 
   
   After spending an hour, Tom realized it was just a stupid excel file and he could just buy a cake for Lisa. This solution seemed so logical and perfect to him that he happily forgot the matter until April came and it was time to celebration time again. "Did you buy a cake for Lisa?" asked Dick. "Oh right, I'll get her cake along with the others", replied Tom. Unfortunately, there were no others. Lisa was the only one to have a birthday in April.
   
   The horror suddenly struck Tom with full force. It meant he'd have to invite everyone in the dept. including the top bosses to the birthday of someone they didn't even knew. Lisa had spent 3 months but no one had ever cared to find out what she did or where she came from. Tom had the following questions in mind:
   
4. How to convince everyone to come to Lisa's birthday (apart from the lure of a free cake)
   
5. How to get a birthday cake (every cake ordered was tracked to the ordering dept. and employee no.)
   
6. Cakes came in different categories according to the employee's grade (extra creamy ones for the "creamy layer"). Tom wasn't sure which grade Lisa came under. 
   
   At times Tom felt like dropping the whole idea but at other times he was worried of his own job as well (after all he was the birthday organizer). And now there were only 2 days left for the celebration. Desperate, Tom went to his boss, Harry to seek advice. Harry hadn't even known about Lisa till now. 
   
   Soon Tom, Dick and Harry held an emergency meeting to sort out the cake affair. "Well if she's sent by the promoters, maybe we can put the cake under their expenses", suggested Harry. "But the birthday celebration is our idea, we can't charge them for our internal practice", retorted Tom, knowing that this task would fall on him eventually. "Yes but don't we have the freedom to function our way? They're just the promoters and cannot interfere with our day-to-day affairs", shot back Harry. "But what are we going to do in the meantime? Even if we send a request for a cake from the promoters' office, it wouldn't arrive on time for Lisa's birthday", lamented Dick. "If they approved the cake", added Tom. As the three stared at each other, Harry decided to get a cake from the sludge account. This was a special account for feeding visitors at A-soles.
   
    
   "So we're all set. Buy a chocolate cake with extra cream for Lisa's birthday. Invite people she's reporting directly to. Keep the celebration during peak working hours when rest of the bosses are busy in meetings so that we wouldn't have to invite them. Simple!", beamed Harry, gloating over an incompetent Tom. "Oh don't spare on the expenses", added Harry as an afterthought.
   
   
   Tom carried out Harry's brilliant solution. He ordered for the cake, organized the party and invited the concerned people one day before. Unfortunately, as was his habit, he sent out the invitations 2 minutes before the office hours ended. So the invitees got the mail the next day, the day of the birthday party. He received a reply by Lisa's boss:
    
   I commend you for organizing a birthday party for someone who isn't a regular employee of the company. While this shows our inclusive policy, I regret that Lisa wouldn't be able to attend the party as she has taken a personal leave.