hash513

Muffy's Full-Moon Hash That Almost Wasn't

As a hare, one balances the fine line between minimal instruction and outright obfuscation. Due to the wide range of running abilities in the Hash, one wants to confuse the FRBs occasionally to give the rest of the group a chance to catch up. Unfortunately, this strategy occasionally unravels, leaving the entire pack of hounds scratching their heads wondering where the trail goes. This is exactly what happened on this particular Wednesday afternoon.

Starting in the parking lot behind Jillian's, the hares wound their way behind the new convention center and the Colonial Center, placing a checkpoint at the corner of Green and Gadsden (here is what it looks like on Google Street View.)

Raptor ran up Greene Street to Assembly, finding only two hashes; others ran down Gadsden toward Blossom, also finding only two hashes (even looking down parts of Devine.) Finally, we decided that the trail must go beyond the dead-end on the western end of Greene, and clambered down to the railroad tracks and Amtrak station—all of which were totally clean of chalk/hash. PP and others scouted large parts of the paved parking lots around the Colonial Center, and I am certain that I saw some crossing the gravel parking lot west of Gadsden. After a good 15-20 minutes of scouring in all directions, we decided to give up and go to the Hunter Gatherer, where we hoped to find the Hares. Realizing that we had no money with us, we abandoned this establishment and returned to the start, raiding Fowl Finger’s Jeep for Hash beer. However, no sooner had the first top been popped, than a breathless Wide Open Spaces (a.k.a. Wide-set) came running to inform us that she and Nantucket had found trail! Being a club “…with a running problem” most of us abandoned our beers in favour of more running—will wonders ever cease!? A hare’s arrow was found on Devine Street pointing across the railroad tracks; dutifully the FRBs ran nearly to Huger before discovering a back-check 7. Back to the tracks we went and turned right toward Blossom…where we found our reward: a BN under the bridge among the homeless encampments we found the standard garbage bag of beverages and ice nestled among a pile of identical garbage bags…containing garbage! The assistant hare, Fowl Finger, showed up and absorbed the brunt of our abuse; had Muffy been there herself, we may have had an incident. ;-)

After the beverages were consumed, Fowl Finger showed us where we should have gone; only an Indian tracker would have found these subtle marking (bluish/grayish/pinkish—I dunno, I’m color-blind—hash through a gray, gravel parking lot.)

In the circle, the Hares were duly punished with down-downs and the most heartfelt rendition of “Shitty Trails” that the Hash has ever sung. Smooth Groove made sure to pile on derision since—only an hour earlier—Muffy was bragging that we would not have to search far from the “BN” to find our beverages (Smoothie had placed “BN” markings hundreds of yards ahead of the actual beer on Sunday’s Hash.) A unanimous decision was made that this was the worst trail this week; normally, this doesn’t mean much—since we only run every other week—but, as a “full moon hash” only 3 days after Sunday’s trail (which featured Smoothie's BN fiasco) this was saying something! Even the assistant hare admitted this had been the worst since Off My Med’s last trail.

Also recognized in the circle were the FRB and DFL—amazingly: Runs Like Raptor, virgins NNJohn and NNJames, and Wandering Dick did a Mexican hat dance in penance for his cranium-gear violation. Despite a valiant effort by Fowl Finger as stunt RA, we mumbled our way through lesser-known Hash Hymns before retiring to our favourite watering hole—The Flying Saucer.

On a sad note, our esteemed RA, Bashful, was absent because he was out of town caring for his ailing mother, who passed away this week. As our good friend and cornerstone of this group, our thoughts and prayers will be with him in this trying time.