The first Hogtown hash after the anniversary (I think I was there, but the staggers make some memories uncertain) was set by Drinks Like a Girl, and he called it the “You’re Only as Old as the Women You Feel” hash. In which case that explains my creeping malaise and iron-poor blood. He could have called it “The Sausagefest Hash”, or just a TWAT, as a succession of members with members ambled through the door of Loons on Roncesvalles. COD, Wet Spot, Pussyfoot, Wet Pussy, our visitor Have Ewe (I think) from Ottawa, Backdoor Buzz, even Shadow, one outie after another. Eventually Rose Eh and Natty Porn arrived to give the hash a softer, more flowery and better smelling atmosphere, but I’ll go with majority opinion as to whether that actually happened.

The run began with Shampoo’s ceremonial checking-of-the-false-trail. Once that was settled the pack was already some ways east on Dundas. Then we were north of Dundas, heading through several alleys with some really quite noteworthy graffiti. We shambled through a supermarket parking lot, past the groups of youts smoking their doobs and wild stylin’ to the block rockin’ beats coming from their SUVs. Well, they were standing around smoking doobs, at least.

This brought us to a correctional facility at the corner of Bloor and Dundas, cleverly disguised as a high school. Now I remember why those were the seven unhappiest years of my life. We were led out back to the track, where we ran around unable to find a way out, stymied by fences.

“Unable to find a way out, stymied by fences” – essentially the premise of a Samuel Beckett play, I believe.

We were then forced to backtrack and navigate several ramps and bridges and such head spin-inducing architectural features. Discombobulation was a prevailing theme for the evening.

That brought us back up to Bloor, where we ducked onto the rail trail on the south side of the street, crossed over Bloor on a bridge, took some steps to emerge once again onto Bloor and headed back the way we had come, but on the other side of the street.

Are we there yet?
The final gruelling portion of the trail saw us enter the mall at the corner of Bloor and Dundas, run through the mall (run? walk? waddle?), exit the mall, go around the corner, then go back in to the beer check at the pub in the mall.

As Drinks said, he spent the first 40 years of his life going in circles.

Which still leaves one year when he was presumably on the straight and narrow.

At the beer check we got to admire Wet Pussy’s fashionable new Nike™ athletic dress shirt he’d worn under his hashing gear, for those times when you want to impress the boss at the meeting and still practice your wind sprints. Our shutterbug Natty made a nuisance of herself as usual, and then left us shocked and intrigued with her admission of having taken “artistic” pictures of herself. “I went to art school”, she said huffily.

The on in was mercifully just down the street. Nobody fell into one of the big holes in the road, as far as I could tell. Casket Case decided to join us at the on in at this point. He said he’d been stuck at work, but perhaps he was reluctant to show his face around the funeral parlour up the street, not after the “incident” last time.