Hash 1001

Following the balmy atmosphere of last week’s hash, there was a distinct chill in the air as 30 or so hashers pulled into the GM car park. The GM himself had parked his car in pole position for easy exit, not surprisingly as he had arrived some 3 hrs earlier. Shivering under a woolly hat, one wonders why he hadn’t turned the heater on. We welcomed a virgin hasher called Simon. Well, he was actually a hasher of many years standing, with a hash name of “Stallion”. When asked why that was his name he said "It was too long ago to remember"!

And so we all gathered for Hash 1001, which had a sinister Orwellian feel about it. Could it be that we were all going to be subjected to our worst nightmares at 10 times the intensity of the original room 101? When our illustrious hare Gerry began his briefing, the tension turned to anxiety as he indicated there was going to be a very tricky bit for the long cutters, and as the short cutters relaxed, he added with a smile that there will be plenty of shiggy for everyone.

There was plenty of banter as the trail headed south east before turning south west through Abbey Park. The recent successful Hash Bash started fading from both memory and conversation as we were lead up the hill and into Nag’s Head Lane.

At just before the 2 mile point we arrived at the long short split. Interestingly 50 percent turned north to go short, while the remainder, with some trepidation, turned south.

After about 5mins the shorts were about to hit some soft stuff, with Kerry accusing Steve of causing major discoloration to her designer trainers. At this very moment the FSBs in the long cutter group faced an even sterner task. As the blobs of flour turned to arrows at ever shorter intervals, how considerate of the hare to make following the run so easy. Of course the FSBs ran straight into the trap, and were suddenly confronted by a vertical drop into a quarry. Unbeknown to them there was a much easier route which Helen managed to find, closely followed by Roger. Now the ever observant Roger had noticed this and called Helen a wimp, and then chuckled when she moosed. But the keen eyed Roger had failed to spot a root, and promptly fell flat on his back, while Helen picked herself up, and ignoring his plight, scampered on.

On on was called and before long we found ourselves running up to the Full Moon pub, with many of us running into a haze of thick cigarette smoke, courtesy of  a few drinkers outside the pub standing with the usual navel contemplation gaze of the outdoor smoker.

Soon we were drifting from farm to farm, and as we ran across yet another field, Kevin thought that some mad horse woman had screeched at us sometime in the distant past nearby. At this point Helen stopped dead in her tracks, thinking she was the subject of the conversation. Now this event had two effects on Helen. First, she had to abandon a conversation with Jo about the advantages of the latest Nike sports bra with integrated goretex nipple warmers. Secondly, she had contrived to miss an on back addressed specifically for her, so she has been elected to do a personal check back next week.

Just as we were nearing the end, Gerry the hare decided that we were going to have a race, with a prize for the winner. This race involved running to a line of trees in the distance, and when the first person reaches the trees, everybody turns around and sprints back. Gerry started the race, and we were off. The older male hashers bravely ran as fast as they could believing they were as fast as they were when they were twenty. The young guns decided on alternative strategies, while one hasher went hells bells for it. Who reached the trees first? You guessed it! At this point the younger males were climbing over each other to get back to the start, and it was Simon the whipping boy who came in first. Unfortunately he made a complete hash of his choice of tactics, and was rewarded with the first prize – to set a choice of his hash in March. On on.