PHHH #1069.9 Sunday, November 27, 2005 Weather: Temperate Start: Somerville Circle Hare: Hand Solo Hounds: Hey YO! Paully, Nuttin' Stuck, Homoerotic Tick Checking for the NSA, Wijpij, Natural Born Lesbian And a Lesbian Lobsterboy Shall Lead Them Hand promised much--"No flashlights!" he exclaimed, agitating from his handheld wireless Blackberry, "No Vienna Fingers! No hot turkey open-faced sandwiches! No women!" Alas, he delivered only on the last three, and would have surely left us to slowly asphyxiate in Bloomy's fragrance department at the Bridgewater Commons Mall, looking in vain for non-talc based powder that would pick up from the Wachspress double cross at Macy's front doors a quarter mile back; that is had it not been for a legendary special guest houndloving crustacean with gender issues. Yes, the hardy trio encountered Lobster Boy, defender of the weak and witless, finder of the magic circle that Nuttin' Stuck, HTC, and Weeppee swore on a stack of honey-dipped pretzels hadn't been outside Bloomy's upstairs doors minutes before. Not that it helped much, for the intrepid crew, having left Paully on the far side of Rt. 28 to dodge the black helicopters in the Duke Gardens, was then faced with the shifting sands of the parking lot and its barricade of trees. No, they didn't have marks and after several circumambulations in the gathering gloom all seemed hopeless when... Yes! Natural Born Lesbian, friend to greyhounds and father of a fetus of indeterminate gender (www.lobsterboyandshrimpgirl.com/Baby-D%20Page.htm), spotted the hare in the middle of the lot doing something rude with a tire gauge. The jig was up, the headlamps were on, and Hand directed us to the local high school for the on in. Who knew where that high school actually was? Fifteen minutes away on a trail denuded of marks in the dark? Why, the loving husband of Shrimp Girl, who led us straight on in to the Saranac Chocolate Lager and some pathetic excuse for Vienna Fingers. A shitty hash all around, notable for crossing under Rt. 22 and over 287, and a Yorkshireman's approach to the use of flour, the marks appearing every 100 yards or so except from the start, where Solo concluded that a quarter mile was too good for us. What's with this Lobster Boy bosh, you ask? Don't get bored looking here (www.lobsterboy.net/ index.html) or grossed out here (http://phreeque.tripod.com/grady_stiles.html), or even nose through endless commentaries on a classic Simpsons episode. Find the cached history of the Dynamic Duo's origins on their original amusing site, which the cognoscenti look forward to seeing reincarnated on a server capable of handling a million hits a week, here: http://64.233.187.104/search?q=cache:ZEAgxgjoZlwJ:www.lobsterboyandshrimpgirl.com/history.htm +%22lobster+boy%22+%22shrimp+girl%22&hl=en&client=firefox-a. Next week: Nonsensei returns! But will she set and get a two-fer for carrying Bjorn's new secret? NEWS-NBL's wife is due to give birth (naturally of course) to a baby Feb 24, 2006. (We'll have to set in North Branch the 26th!). What a FN mess. Bits of chalk were on cement in the beginning. We were like rats scampering around parking lots when we got to a check with 2 and nothing one way and 2 and nothing the other. The pack eventually too the right way another 1/4 mi. to the next mark, and they were further thwarted with mark chaos, swamps, mall (inside and out). I went the other way and just kept running - through Raritan Station, Duke Island Park, North Branch Park, to Power Line to 28 back to circle. I ran for about 1:54. I had to wait for the pack to get back (luckily Nuttin Stuck back door was open so I didn't have to hang out in the Electric Expo - a guy in a dapper suit kept asking me for help, there were no games on all of there TVs anyway - don't know why). I was told the rest of the pack ended around 5 p.m. as well - the same time I got back to cars - but they had much standing around scratching their heads time - but it took them 1:55 more or less as well.