GFH3 Run #1,693; 20 April 2013

About 35 people gathered at Spurt's in Sterling, amidst sunshine, blue skies, colorful flowers in spring bloom and happy birds trilling their delight.  Strac showed off his knee scar some more, Easy Strider peddled syrup from a saddle bag, and Maggy and Peanut and Cammy and Abby and Kylie bumped noses and chatted a bit.  The group divided up into a dozen or so walkers and four runners.  So who were all those other people, who started out on the runners' trail but wound up back at Spurt's long before the real runners did, without having experienced at least two spider checks, a double-back-check, and a short sprint through a back yard?  You may characterize them however you wish, assuming there are no impressionable children around when you're doing your characterizing.

Yes, it's true -- Spurt, Paddle My Candee Ass and Cockpit Ejeculator committed hours of their day, their considerable brainpower, and a few sacks of flour to creating a devious and inspiring trail, and two-thirds of the pack was too confused, sleepy, ungrateful or some combination thereof actually to follow it.  The discipline in this group is whatever the opposite of inspiring is.

Yes, that's a check.  Spurt is famous for this sort of thing.

The semi-runners also missed out on a small but highly entertaining playground.  I wonder what the photos show about that...

At least they didn't miss the On In, which was chock-a-block with excitement.  There was lasagna with rolls and salad, and wine in a black box, and beer and stuff.  And there was the Mufti calling the roll, and Byte Me carrying out a darned fancy chocolate cake, with a big fat candle, in celebration of Dave's birthday, and a bonus cake that looked like flan or cheesecake or something (too busy hoovering up the chocolate shavings to get a definite read on that), and a terrifying caterwaul that passed for singing, and a birthday boy who doesn't seem to have caught on quite perfectly to the speech-giving protocol (there are no rules), and there was Jess there for her first run, and finally there was the Mufti, double-checking his lists only to discover... (whispering) he made a mistake.

Turns out it was Joyce's 100th run, and the fez came out, and the nicknames considered were, almost without exception, absolutely stupid as could be (Cums with Novocaine?  Really?).  But the final choice was pretty entertaining:  Beef Strokemoff.  That's the kind of thanks you can expect for feeding this group home-cooked gourmet extravaganzas.

YAAAAAAAYYYYYY!!!!!

So Beef S. got her purple t-shirt, poignantly accepted the cup from her own daughter, took one mouthful of the beer-water-wine mix within, and, in tribute to her profession, rinsed briefly and spit the swill over the side of the deck.  Her heartfelt tribute to the joys (?!?) of hashing kept getting interrupted by cheers and shouting, so she quite reasonably gave up.  Probably wishes she'd tried that giving-up thing before she got a purple t-shirt that invites the world to think of her as "Beef Strokemoff."

I did not get a photo of the spitting, but most of the other stuff described is pictured here.

GFH3 Run #1,680; 19 Jan 2013

Happy Birthday, Irene/Mimi/Boom-Boom!

Blue skies and sunshine smiled on Oakton in celebration of Irene's 101st birthday.  You read that right:  101 years old.  Cockpit Ejeculator and Paddle My Candee Ass somehow felt that a hash was the best way to celebrate Grandmother's big day, but didn't want to haul everyone out to Warrenton, so Jill and Norm kindly threw open their doors for about 40 of us.  The runners spent 70 or 80 minutes traversing five miles of Oakton's woodsy trails, and our clever hares threw in a few checks toward the end that brought a strung-out pack back together again, with the FRBs cheerfully pounding back down a nice bit of hill on Miller Heights.  Back into the woods, runners!  And along the streambed of Difficult Run...  I sincerely believe that Spurt tried to check a map on some sort of E.D. (electronic device, for heaven's sake).  There are no rules, but there is such a thing as using your own wit, surely.

The walkers meandered the trails for a bit less than an hour, enjoying gorgeous weather and charming conversation.  So not a lot new there, bar Drill Me Fill Me's handsome white cap.

Everyone made it safely across the run, thankful for the vigilance of fellow hashers.

Back at the house, there was a Festgelage of bratwurst, roasted meats of many kinds, sauerkraut, potato salads, varied mustards and more, more, more.  There are some distinct advantages to having your hash crash a birthday party.  Plenty of beer (St. Pauli Girl, etc.), the ever-popular Black Box wine, a great pot of glugwein of some type, and bottle on bottle of German wine helped wash it all down.  There were also platters of cookies, which was just silly given two gigantic birthday cakes.  However.

Our Mufti having fled to tropical climes with BC3 to celebrate their anniversary (hey!  they celebrated that two weeks ago.  There were flowers, cheers and a kiss.  What is this vacation nonsense?), the Associate Mufti presided with vigor and flair over the roll.  He noted a special occasion with Chugger's birthday, which Chugger claims is his 69th.  One takes leave to doubt.  The hash graciously put forth their usual lousy effort in the traditional birthday chorale, and cheered the subsequent speech with vim.  Oral Advocate also took note of Hasher Flasher's 299th run and threatened the usual exec. comm. session.

Then we got to the good stuff.  With rare grace and elan, the Oral Advocate wished Irene a happy, happy 101st birthday and fourth hash run.  He further advocated for a reasonably in-tune and on-tempo rendition of Happy Birthday, and more or less got it.  The cakes came out, the candles blazed, the birthday girl accepted her cheers with a great string of carnations around her neck.  What a wonderful, charming and patient person.  Here's to 101 more.

The executive committee meeting was about par.  Oral Advocate made many comparisons to constitution-drafting and congressional-dealmaking; various elements debated raunchy vs. nice; the 'inspirations' and votes flew, and in the end I believe some kind of decision happened.  I don't know for sure, as I wandered off to chat with Irene instead.  Much more rewarding.  [UPDATE:  Hasher Flasher was renamed Pink Parts, but upon learning what those are, chose to become Bionic Babe instead.]

Executive Committee members must be hand-fed as they focus on their critical task.

Incidentally, Spurt carefully clipped a recent Washington Post Health & Science article headlined:  "Ancients toasted the dawn of civilization with beer bashes."  Having missed the word 'civilization,' he apparently believes this may be relevant in some wise to hashing.  You can decide for yourself by reading the piece here.

And if you'd like to see some photos of today's hash, try here.