(Courtesy Brown Finger)
It was the afternoon after the infamous night before – the drunken Animal Dinner!
The wise word on the songthaew was that the hares, Alice and his much better other half, or more
correctly, his perfectly formed other ninety-nine percent, Fandango, had been instructed to set a
short trail – no Wimp/ Rambo – for the benefit of all the assholes who couldn’t get enough of the
free bar the night before. But, no! Who the F is Alice if not an absolute asshole himself? And then
there was Chuck Wao giving me grief for not having been as drunk as him during the past two days,
moaning about how he hadn’t been able to sleep at night, and it wasn’t fair, and he wouldn’t be able
to keep up with me, and more shit like that . . .?
The hare brief was long and gushing, full of blue paper things and tales of trouble with the natives
stealing the trail, and about special checks named after specific hashers. And all the time the storm
clouds were gathering ominously above or heads . . .
Finally we were off, and sure enough a few hundred meters out we came to a Superman check,
where the FRB’s had to wait for Superman to arrive or twelve hashers – yes, 12! It goes without
saying that the twelve won the race; Sups was nowhere to be seen. So off we set again. Not much
had changed from the start, except that time had moved on even if we ourselves hadn’t, much, and
all the time the storm clouds were gathering ominously in the heavens . . .
A much happier Chuck Wao, now he was out in front, led us on through special Skid Mark and
Graven Image checks, and there was even a Brown Finger check, or so I was told back at the A. This
was the third run in the area in the past week, so we knew the trails fairly well. The hares had done
a splendid job collecting all the girly pink paper from previous trails and replacing it with manly blue,
and the manly testosterone was flowing through Chuckie Ducky’s protruding veins; he was having
the time of his life up front, all on his lonesome, hitting the correct trails off the checks time and
time again. And all the time the storm clouds overhead were gathering in ever deepening shades of
grey and black . . .
And then we hit a corker! Chuck Wao checked right at a circle and went up and over a small hillock
that Graven and I knew from very recent experience led nowhere whatsoever. We more informed
twosome checked a couple of trails off to the left and found the right one going sharply upwards.
Graven called on on, loudly, the circle was kicked out, and everyone else followed . . . except for
a now rather sick and disgusted Chuck Wao who proclaimed Graven a silent running bastards to
anyone who would listen to his rabid rants and raves, and all the time the thunder in the gathered
storm clouds was gaining in tempo and volume . . .
Finally, with the rain falling in sharp-edged glass sheets, we hit the final difficult check, which after
much fruitless huffing and puffing and the arrival of a lot of non-checking-hashing-bastards,Turkey
Burgler found the trail and led us back to the A, and all the time the rain was falling harder and
harder and the wind was blowing stronger and stronger and the lightening was crashing to earth all
around us, cracking like amplified stagecoach whips . . .
Thank god for the shelter, but I and a few others stayed for a long while in the songthaew, and
even there the strength of the wind fired the rain right through to the back like a billion bullets of
ice. This had one big advantage for the boys in the back . . . HRA persuaded Cumalot to strip off her
wet clothes and put something dry on. Tulips held up a very thin piece of cloth, the size of a small
handkerchief, to protect her modesty, but . . .
So, a great job Alice and Fandango. One against the very big head of the Horny Asshole GM, because
there was definitely, against all the rules, a Rambo trail, and the supposedly short hangover run
turned out to be 7.5k. Oh I do love a decent run, especially when I was not suffering like Chuck Wao
from over exploitation of an open bar, and other debauched activities that caused him sleepless
nights . . .!
Photos courtesy of Alice
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