PRINCETON HHH HASH #755.4 Date: January 23, 2000 Weather: Long Venue: Sololand Set by: Solo Time: 1:56----> forever Hashers: First Wave Rojo, Geezer, Wacko, Wrong Way (finish 1:56) Second Wave: Tropical Depression, Ice Blue Balls, LLLoda, Discomfort, Uranus, Schwa, Squirrel Droppings, (Minor)3 Tom the Army Guy, Booger (finish ca. 2:30) Third Wave: Hey Yo! Paully, Alex, Will, Juicy, Rookies: Kim Regan, Chris Brander and a visitor from Rumson (finish? what's that?) Descriptions, Polemics, and Lies: More Tales from the Belle Meade Inn I felt my way down the darkened staircase of the Belle Meade Inn to Zaire's favorite taproom. The Inn has been boarded up for years now, but Jorge still serves up frosty Stegmeiers to a few of the old crowd, and nobody seems to care that the Zaire and the Cuban Assassin still use it. Probably Jorge cares, but Zaire is still holding his passport, and Jorge remembers well what happened to the Belgian dwarf. There was none of the usual raucous laughter, but the air of malevolence that always pervades the place was more palpable than ever. I was amazed to find Solo there, sitting under the only light. Both the big Cuban and Zaire were in the dark, but there was something strange about their heads. Solo looked uncomfortable. I stopped to eavesdrop. "There's no choice, Solo," I heard Zaire say in the quiet tone that conveys so much menace, "they published our pictures, they have to pay, and you are going to extract the payment." It was then that I noticed the bandages. Both Zaire and the Assassin looked like mummies - clearly there had been some substantial plastic surgery done. "No less than two hours of pain, and some of them are not to finish. I don't care where you do it, or what happens to them, but I expect a lesson to be learned." Solo left without a word. And so now you know why it happened. Zaire's instructions were carried out to the letter. I append a note found in the woods from some of those who were lost: Let me tell you a little story, Once upon a windswept Sunday afternoon, two nameless but intrepid rookies of yon Princeton House of Harried Hashing did venture out across the snowbound fields of cornstalk and furrow with it eagerly in mind to catch a lead group of hashers who had gone on-trail not a quarter hour before. As it happens, these two were well dressed for the occasion: both by virtue of their hats, gloves, and generous layers of clothing and by the shared look of sheer obfuscation so common among audiences of one Hand Solo. And so it was. They ran hither. They ran thither---thither frequently turning out to be a deeply perplexing false end. But fear not, for our barely initiated protagonists were undaunted, in fact spurred to greater efforts to track the elusive handfuls of pink dust. On and on, over the hill, through the powdery rows of shin-high crop, dodging Cessnas. And if the blushing spots of baking ingredient were unavailable, still there were the unmistakable Arctic Depressions left in the snow left by a Sasquatch sized creature chasing our hasher friends in a pair of size 16 New Balance. What terrain! What a great time! What a freakin' long hash!.....Krikey!, after exiting the Blair Witch Woods, it was on-on to the Creepville Subdevelopment.....and now we're wondering what kind of trouble we might be in since its just the two of us half-wits to run down everything in Solo's playbook of "Check Mark Jokes I Can Play on Rookie Hashers in Waning Daylight." We cross a stream, we cross a blown down tree, we cross into complete and utter darkness. Bent at the waist we holler at each other as we study footprints left hours before in the faint illumination of suburban-industrial glow that supplants a sunset...."What are you following?...Dunno, looks like they all went that way....but......they come back!....and here.....wait, they all come together here......Hey! You're not gonna believe what I just found!---what's that? "Pink Dust!"....."Damn, Will. ON-ON!" Let it stand for the record that we made it to the Princeton Elks Lodge on Rte. 518 at 6PM, and then discovered what everyone else who made it that far discovered.....Solo was serving up more "Fun With Vectors Through Ankle-Braking Private Property"....so we did what any self respecting hashers would do when it becomes clear that it's time to start drinking--we On and Inned at the nearest heated building and promptly began yelling obscenities at the football players on TV. This, to match volume with two surpassingly witless convenience store attendants who couldn't even tell us which town we were in. (there's catharsis in there somewhere, I know it.) One phone call and the cavalry was on its way to get us--no thanks to our fellow hashers, it seems, who were content to drop our dry bags a good 7 miles from our car Chez Geezer. We're told it was an anonymous kindness, a "drive-by-bagging": befuddling logic considering the fact that we were parked AT THE GRAND UNION!, but a welcome gesture and we are thankful to whomever remembered us. (We did eventually call the Jones residence and had the good fortune to have our call answered my Mrs. Geezer who was delighted to know that hashers were on their way over.......ah, not even a little.) And so it was.... Weepii, I think it's your bedtime now. ( This amusing misadventure courtesy of Lost and Found hashers Alex Morton and Will Innis.) Proximate Next Hash: #757.4, Sunday, Jan 30, 2 pm, 87 Prospect, Geezer sets. #758.4 Sunday, Feb 6, 2 pm, 87 Prospect, Schwa! and Rambo attempt to set the Pre-Hardt Kore dehymenation hash. This will also be the annual "G" hash. #759.4, Sunday, Feb 13, 2 pm? 87 Prospect, Tropical Depression and IceBlueBalls set the Hard Corpse VIII. NO MONEY, NO T-SHIRTS, NO WHINING, NO MERCY!