Conspirators

C5 Uplift OldDog Dumper Septic Hashgate Iceman PP Tony Claire and dog Barney Potty Nutcracker Simple DunnyStumbler Baldrick Foghorn Motox P*ssquick Chopstix Shandyman BlouseBlazer Spot Hitchiker Mother Theresa Lemming Ms Whiplash Salome Sh*tShoveller Centaur Cerberus Spex BillyBullsh*t Loudon Tasteless Sh*tfor Desperate Mr Ben Louise Matt Tinopener Lilo and dog Emma Honeymonster LittleStiffy SlackBladder Flash Dave Fannybag Florence Zebedee Lonely Bootsie Cheating Colin Sue UsedRubber Sunbeam Package Quack Bogey Effin Generator SlowSucker

Remember Remember the 5^th of November

Dumper, (Mother)Theresa and Spot

At least Iceman was getting into the swing of November 5^th. As I drew my car surreptitiously up beside his on the M4 he suddenly realised something had edged into his peripheral vision, glanced round in an alarmed manner and mouthed, “F’ Fawkes sake!” at me as I gave him a cheery grin and an up-and-down hand movement that I’m not sure he recognised as an attempt to describe a big rocket. He seemed to follow me very closely as we sped along the country lanes, leaning forward over the steering wheel and gesticulating, no doubt to assist us on our way to the unknown destination.

Today’s explosive event was originally going to star Butterfly and Incider as Hares. However, Incider decided that moving to Somerset was a far better option (it was, trust me; and if you are reading this, Incider, good luck in your new home – come and see us some time) so Dribbler got dragged in, kicking and screaming, at the last moment. However, the husband and wife team seemed to work extremely well, particularly on the stunningly well executed Bar Checks. But Lemming and I wondered about the Checks with two Circles. Perhaps they had disagreed over the course of the trail. “I want it to go this way Max.” “No you don’t Angie. Look, I’ll lay a proper Circle over here and we’ll go that way.” “If you lay that Circle you fat-nosed wombat I’ll... Right that’s it!” Which accounts for several splashes of flour at certain points on the road near Checks and a slight darkening of the skin round Dribbler’s left eye. We certainly couldn’t fault the Bar Checks, though, as C5 found out to his cost. Though hampered because he is currently growing another toe out of his heel he ran right to the front of the Pack and streamed down the road like… like an old bloke running down the road. Oh, all right, I couldn’t catch him. He was going too fast. Little whirlwinds of condensed air spiralled off his elbows and the soles of his plimsolls glowed dark red with heat. Until he screeched to a stop at the Bar-9. When I caught up the torrent of words he had been uttering slowly dried up and he stood there panting, an empty husk. The tarmac looked rather blistered in the direction of his speech. The second Bar was a very artistic Bar-5 crafted on top of a short but fairly steep tarmac hill that Colin and I felt had to be Checked Out; so we altruistically trotted up to the top of it, remarked on the superbly clean lines of the road-wide bar and the ‘5’, acknowledged the applause, way down below, of Butterfly and returned to attempt to catch the Pack that had stampeded off across a wet field.

The day had started very well in the car park with Dumper attempting to remove Septic’s bra next to their VW Beetle that was displaying a large flower (a gerbil? Jereboam? Septic told me) on the bonnet. Personally, I’d rather be fried in batter and eaten in a bap by John Prescott than drive around in a car with a flower on it. Each to their own I guess. Dumper was obviously in a skittish mood today since he also dived earthwards in the woods directly in front of me just after we started. Then leapt to his feet as though on springs. For this he was later passed the BH3 brolly by OldDog who awarded it to him for being the fastest BH3 male Hasher to get erect from a prone position today.

Now early on Tony and I had rather stupidly gone almost backwards from a Check down a farm track while everyone else had correctly gone straight on. Since we had all just run past an alsation factory it was aural bedlam as any number of these magnificent creatures were barking hysterically behind the fencing. This was amusing enough but as Tony and I retired to our separate bushes for an early ‘comfort break’ and a long distance chat I became aware of ‘something’ off to our right in a fenced-off field. I looked over; and burst out laughing. A rising tide of grey-headed, black feathered turkeys flooded out of a large barn, their curiosity prickled at the sound of our loud talking. You could not see their feet moving – just the swirl of the flock as they filled the field, all looking our way. What with this and the dogs still barking manically to our left how we ever got running again is a mystery to me. A golden moment.

The Hares had laid some quite crafty bits of trail that cut back across some fields, went round the edge of a few, went into others with no obvious exit and caused us quite a bit of trouble. Though the morning was fresh and clear and the sun was shining so it was really no trouble at all to end up ¼ mile in the opposite direction to the correct way so that I could view a fine little Methodist Chapel that had been built in 1914 and that had a set of organ pipes above its clean, white painted door. Two Regroups were provided for our rest. Which was rather necessary since they were both reached only after some serious slogging up uneven hills. Particularly the second near Enborne that saw FannyBag and Iceman just about out on their feet. I think I actually saw Spot at this point. He was obviously having a good day since we had hardly seen him. Zebedee and Florence had appeared too; having arrived late they had had to steam round to try and catch up. We all had to steam round on this second part of the Hash. It all seemed to speed up and we lost sight of Lemming, Mother T etc. Only saw the returnees Shandyman and Chopstix once (they’ve been horsing around apparently). Didn’t see SlackBladder, Lonely and a good many others at all. Did see quite a lot of Baldrick though. He was skipping about at the front with that semi-seated style of running of his for a good portion of the trail and seemed particularly adept at finding well-hidden stiles with flour blobs on while apparently wandering off-trail. All right for some. I must mention our two youngest Hashers today: Louise and Matt. We have seen them before but it’s still quite a surprise to see them streaking across the fields and down the roads like a pair of road runners with Crazy Coyote close on their heels. Unlike many of their contemporaries these kids are fast, without the food.

We must congratulate Butterfly and Dribbler on this longish, varied and interesting trail. But then, since they actually started BH³ fifty years ago they should have learned something about trail laying shouldn’t they?

OldDog will be your Scribe next week. Thanks very much to her. I have no doubt you’ll give her plenty to write about. See you in a couple of weeks.

On On. Hashgate.

Down Downs

RA Simple (Hurrah! He’s back) presented the following :-

Stunning wine Down

Up and Coming