Against all better judgement, it was decided that we would have a run on the Monday following the Hardwick Hall weekend. The practicalities of this decision meant that it would have to be a live hare event.

It's easy to agree to being a live hare when your pi**ed out of your tiny mind on a hash away weekend, but when it comes to the crunch it's a bit unnerving. But as they say the show must go on.

It's Paintball's birthday and his new bike is ready at the Cycledelia shop in Hitchin. So I decide to skive off w**k, drop the Alpha into the garage (as its due its 24000 mile service), walk to the bike shop, pickup the new bike and then ride it home.

It's not that far, but I still end up home totally knackered and with a live hare run impending it's all getting a bit worrying.

Penetrator and Paintball meet at the Greyhound at the agreed time of 6:30. We wrack our brains over the map for a bit and finally decide on a strategy that involves us splitting up and each laying half of the run. There are one or two meeting points and if we get it right, we should manage to lay a complete trail.

As agreed we set off at 7:10 (i.e. 20 mins. before the usual start). The only people to have arrived at this time are Mike and Blow Job. The hares immediately split up so as to fox everyone and not give any initial steer as to which way to go.

Penetrator laid the initial part of the trail that eventually led to Dead Man's Cross and eventually to Chicksands Woods. Whilst Penetrator did this, Paintball laid the bit of the trail through Chicksands Woods. At this point, I feel that I ought to apologise for the bars that should have been Ts, but in my defence although I did realise my errors, I felt under too much time pressure to be able to afford the luxury to backtrack and correct the mistakes.

As it turned out, the hash didn't even get close to the hares, and the first real sign of any hashers was when we finished laying the final loop and we encountered No Knickers and Sasquatch who were short cutting back to the village.

I would like to thank the local villager who persisted in washing out our check-point, despite me taking time out to explain the purpose of the check and the fact that it was fabricated from the finest of natural ingredients. We actually laid this check twice and it was washed out on both occasions (arsehole!!).

Sorry we can't relate any more of the run, but we weren't there and to make matters worse Penetrator had to dash off, even before most of the hash had got back to the pub, because he had some rels. visiting.

Down-downs were awarded to Paintball (for his fine display of live haring) and again for his birthday. I would like to thank G-String for arranging Abbot, instead of IPA, for the down-downs as this ensured that the rest of the evening was a bit of a blur. In fact I got such a buzz, that I cannot remember much else, except that down-downs were also awarded for the following:

• Rajah for Cynophobia (look it up)
• Dan Dare for allowing his dog to attack the GM's dog.
• Later on Dan Dare (the secret RA) awarded a down-down to the GM, but I don't know what for (was it a case of getting his own back?)
• My Little Pony got an award for texting home on the hash
• As usual, awards were also given for mas***bat**g on the hash

Paintball and Penetrator