There is nothing like a Hogtown AGM to bear witness to what is known as the Peter Principle: the tendency, within organizations, for its members to rise to their own level of incompetence. As evidence we will offer the new co-GMs: Rose Eh and Johnny Cockring, whose erections to high office thus ensure that at some point in the near future the hash will be both insolvent and under indictment. And Shadow as RA? What part of “and Shadow is an idiot” do we not understand? And the most ridiculous of all is making Shampoo hash scribe again, whose veracity, reliability and eloquence have been so grievously impaired by his slight case of tertiary syphilis and delirium tremens…

            (Harvey, put down the knife. Put it down. What’s that you say? The nuns are coming for us, unfurling their claw-tipped wings and baring their bloody teeth? Yaaaaaaaaah! Who moved my coconuts!)

            And yet it had all started so well. It was a fine day for hashing, if cool. The rain in the morning held off in the afternoon but promised good shiggy where available. We were assembled at the lovely Casa Venta, with a few visitors joining us and some backsliders making an appearance (Kazoo and Trix, and later Ra, H2Ho and Ultimate). Trail went through some suburban streets, under the 401, through some more suburban streets and then through very nice raviny bits in Earl Bales Park. Trail checking was impeded by well-meaning busybodies rubbing out marks set in the anthrax/rat poison mixture Hump Day used to set trail.

            We skirted the hills next to a golf course, careful not to step on the grass lest the vengeful spirit of Johnny Cockring materialize to yell at us to get the fuck off the greens like he did at Durham a while ago. Then a life-saving combined beer and vodka pudding check appeared. Bevvies and snacks were consumed (and let’s face it, who doesn’t like pudding?) while Casket Case invited all to admire his balls (golf, that is).

            Then there was a steep slippery climb out of the ravine up to the surface of the earth. Shampoo nearly stepped in a rotting maggoty animal carcass that reminded him too much of his ambitions and life goals. Coming out of the ravine, visitor Fish Finger was accosted by an irate homeowner demanding to know what we were doing on “her” property. Trusting, naïve soul, Fish Finger identified the hash, provided contact info, our sacred rules number one through six and an itinerary of upcoming events, instead of just saying we were the Young Christians for Sexual Propriety and Sober Living.

            And then on on over the 401 and on in to the second beer check at a bar on Avenue Road ­– verrry niiiiice!

            In the back yard at Casa Venta Hump Day dispensed the last down downs of his official duties, before the Secret Service whisked him away to his Presidential Library and those lucrative speaking tours. Then Venta and Moist Leatherette dished up fabulous chow, before Dung Dodger got down to business breaking all the glasswear in the kitchen. Moon Man waved around his dog clippers, which just like a revolver in the first act of a Chekhov play would appear later. But after the scribe had gone home – FLAB gave Backdoor Buzz a Russian army recruit haircut, though I heard nobody was looking at Buzz.

            The hair, meanwhile, crawled under the sofa and went to sleep, and Zephyr let it out in the morning thinking it was the dog. It is now available as material for arts and crafts. Merkins anyone?

View photos of this hash here