Ye Olde Leathern Hashers (and a few young ones)

Honeymonster SlackBladder Quack Hashgate Motormouth 2Bob Puddleduck Itsyor Fiddler Sh*tShoveller Tw*nky LoudonTasteless Spex Shandyman Margaret Dave Vlad Drac Steve David Spot Hitchiker Bomber Premature Cerberus Paula Sue Barbara BlouseBlazer Little Stiffy Iceman Baldrick ScarletPimpernel Lucy Snowballs C5 ShutupWally OldF*rt Dumper Septic Motox The Tremblers Dutch Donut Uplift Mrs Blobby Utopia Ms Whiplash David P*ssquick Glittert*ts Tim Charlie Nicky OldDog Zebedee Florence. And later… HeadBoy Chopstix (who had been doing something with horses)

SlowSucker’s Wokingham (Marathon) Hash

Since Matt (incredibly fast runner, occasional breaker of leg and carrier of Slowsucker’s genes – yes, that thought made me shudder too) is currently touring the fleshpots, ladyboy brothels and opium dens of the Orient he was unable to be Hare with his old dad tonight so the old dad roped in the unwitting Bl*wJob to help lay his Hash version of the London Marathon. Now there may not have been anyone dressed as chickens or rhinos but there were plenty of those, shall we say, slightly more mature runners so beloved of the Tower Bridge type BBC interviewers – “Hello sir, what’s your name?” Asks Colin Jackson, thrusting a furry microphone forward. “Erm… Dumper.” Comes the reply from the still trotting interviewee. “Marvellous, marvellous. And may I ask how old you are sir?” “Er…Don’t know.” “Ha, ha. What time do you think you’ll finish today?” “Er… Don’t know.” Colin smiles rather desperately at the camera. “Well I don’t want to keep you sir. Enjoy the rest of the…” “Here.” Leers the interviewee, grabbing the mike. “That Sue Barker’s a fine bit of stuff. I wouldn’t mind…” Colin breaks in desperately as the camera wheels quickly to a crowd shot. “Ha, ha. Yes, thankyou sir. Now back to the studio.”

In fact, the Hash (surprisingly enough for SlowSucker) wasn’t too long but, due to rapidly descending dusk had to be run at breakneck pace which meant there was little opportunity for me to see stuff happening. So if I miss out a lot of stuff you saw, sorry about that; and if you didn’t see any stuff well you didn’t miss anything anyway; and… oh stuff it.

It was very nice to see young Lucy back tonight. She is one of ScarletPimpernel’s stable of young fillies. He’s been a forlorn, lone figure during the winter. Tonight saw him looking confident and assured. Let’s hope no-one tells Lucy of his alter ego – Rent Boy. Motormouth made an astute observation while we waited for the Circle to gather. Looking over towards the profile view of Hitchiker with her hair tied up in a ponytail he said, “Coo, she looks just like Bridget Jones.” She does, doesn’t she? Obviously many, many pounds lighter. Must be nice to for her to look like Renee Zelw.. Renee Zwell.. oh you know who I mean. Wonder if she has any big pants?

We ought to congratulate the Hares for laying a trail that confused the Pack quite so much. Early on, Lonely made a bid for glory by bursting off left from the pub and whipping down the snicket we went down last time. He uttered a gloriously triumphant ‘On On!’ back to Cerberus, Dave and myself at the fourth blob then stopped suddenly. His shoulders drooped, he turned round and shambled dejectedly back to the surprised followers who, much to the consternation of the Hares no doubt, had also been screaming “On On”. “Four blobs and a False. Tchah!” He snorted in best Basil Fawlty style. We On Backed desperately to try and catch up. A further obfuscatory, nay obnubilatory (look that one up, Premature!) device, an ‘FFC’ (Fecking Field Check) appeared and the Pack went into confusion mode, spreading wide and far with no-one finding any flour until SlowSucker appeared and pointed Motormouth and myself to a small hillock of the stuff hidden behind a post. We thanked him and sped on to the Hash View. This was laid on a quiet suburban road lined with pleasant houses and OldF*rt, Itsyor, Fiddler, Glittert*ts etc tarried idly, wondering why it was there. Eventually it was explained to us that the pleasant house opposite was the BlouseBlazer mansion and we explained this to every other puzzled Hasher who subsequently fetched up at that point before we got bored and zipped off to find challenges anew. We didn’t need to enjoy the challenge of the next big Check since Mrs Blobby and Utopia had already checked it for us. We thanked them for their input and entered a large, downward-sloping field where we came upon C5, Dumper and LoudonTasteless all trudging along together, glumly complaining about their physical infirmities, the impending darkness, women getting the vote and the price of fish (see Down Downs, below). Always nice to see people having a good time. That rather fine Barkham Church (and Check) appeared and we thought we’d stolen a march on the Hares when we found an almost hidden pathway opposite it. While Spot sped onwards Glittert*ts opined prophetic wisdom to Dave and me, “The last time it went along here,“ he said, “it didn’t.” And indeed it didn’t this time either. We had to On Back, enter what looked like someone’s front garden (it was a sports pavilion area) then struggle our way through a thorny bush. Florence stood aside and waved me through. Poor girl, she was obviously deeply affected by the (kindly meant) comments in last week’s Gobsheet and was making sure I was in front of her. She was also wearing a very long T shirt and informed me in no uncertain manner that she gets quite enough attention, thankyou, without unwarranted press intrusion. Quite right too.

A long, long run along a brick-strewn, ankle-breaking track with Cloggs followed. Then a long, long lump of field (well done young Charlie for showing us all how to do it) broken only by a mid-field gate that Sh*tShoveller was just about to chest himself over when he noticed the rusty barbed wire on the top and sagely decided on using the stile instead. The next field was where the Hares had laid the Fish Hook (first ten people to it return to the rear of the Pack) and I have to report that the only person to return to the rear was the honest Fiddler. Unlike his recalcitrant dad, Itsyor, who skulked awhile with Iceman and Shandyman before kicking out the hook end of the mark and carrying on without a care in the world. Shame on you chaps!

The Regroup at the entrance of an apparently disused track worked perfectly with the runners arriving at the same time as the walkers, idlers, ne’er do wells and general hoi polloi and we enjoyed a couple of minutes of chatter before an ancient car appeared from nowhere up the track and attempted to knock down as many Hashers as possible. Luckily it failed. We carried on, some on the Long trail, some on the Shorter and Iceman and Old F*rt were quickly caught out by a long Two-Way Check. The rest of us followed a winding path through the dry, spongy-floored forest which seemed to go on for ages. I must say it was good to see Zebedee springing along despite his achilles injury. Let’s hope it goes away soon. Acres of forest, past a golf course, along a track, more woods and we bumped into Dumper, Septic and SlowSucker before going right off trail and being called back. And then it all got a bit (more) confusing as Margaret, Florence, Motormouth and myself found Bars in all directions and a pair of lost wanderers i.e. C5 and Glittert*ts. Luckily, Baldrick and Trembler had a pretty good idea of the direction so we followed them until the rear of the pub hove into view. ShutupWally chattered past, determined to be ‘first’. Believe it or not, we let him go, legs and mouth going twenty to the dozen, before trotting casually back to the cars in the deepening gloom. Thanks Hares – a job well done.

On On. Hashgate. (Yes, Lucy, I write the Gobsheets)

Down Downs

Standin (and virgin) RA Hashgate presented the following with ineffable bravura style to a number of standing ovations, thrown underwear (sadly, most of it male) and excited screams of, “Encore!” Thanks go to Motormouth for helping record the awards for inclusion in this Gobsheet.

Dumper sipped a dainty half. The others were far more manly about it.

Up and Coming