It was raining buckets. Seriously, buckets. Pouring over The Times while contemplating whether or not I should even show up to the hash, I took into consideration my abuse of those who had rallied for my run in similar weather over a recent Thanksgiving weekend:

"Don't you have any place better to be? A movie perhaps? Or curled up on a sofa somewhere?"

They had all stared back at me, forlorn, meek and silent, but still answering with a somber "no" in their looks. Immediately I felt terrible about my mean behavior -- but it was cold and wet, and I had caked flour all over me without any truly "reasonable" explanation for it at all.

That said, I realized that showing up in the torrential rain on this day would prove that, just like the others, I didn't have any better place to be either (a criticism of today's cinema at best, an admission of "sad bastard-ism" at worst). But then again, given that the hare was the swift and nimble Dave Long, the possibilities of having an "ALL LIVE" trail extravaganza seemed pretty strong, and that was a good enough excuse for me.

Showing up at 23rd and 3rd, a group that would swell to no more than twelve of us hunkered under the awning of a bodega as we awaited Dave's arrival. He showed up soon enough, not donning his blue and red-striped shorts as I had hoped (for live hare purposes only) but in a bright yellow rain slicker and porkpie hat, with a bag of at least ten pounds of unused flour and girlfriend as co-hare in tow. It was at that very moment that I knew we were screwed.

With all hopes lost for live trails, we set north on Third Avenue, and looped around to Madison Square Park where we came upon a check. I guess we were lucky we had gotten even that far, because, that's as far as it went for me. Sure, we ran up and down in every possible direction, finding a couple of marked falses, but all attempts to find the trail were to no avail. Roy, Elaine and I kept getting pulled West, but aside from our mistaking trash on the streets for flour, there was nothing. After about a half hour of checking at the first mark, I commended myself for carrying my cell phone, and armed with the knowledge that the hotline had already been set I pulled a quintessential David Byron-Brown maneuver and gave up on the trail before it put me in a foul mood and went on a Walkabout.

My adventure led me to the Flatiron District, where I did some last minute Christmas browsing through Restoration Hardware and Ann Taylor, and I even tried on a really cute skirt at Club Monaco. Now, I know David wouldn't try on skirts, but I did manage to hold back from the temptation of entering a nearby McDonald's for a pre-on-in snack, and for this I should be rewarded.

Then it was back North to West 24th Street for another attempt at stalking down my latest cable-series actor-crush, Chris Noth. (Hey, forgive me, but he's a single, 40-something, sexy, 6'4", intense and witty man living large in Manhattan -- truly a rare find - and not unlike our trail.) Anyway, apparently he owns a bar on that street and ever since I saw the episode where Carrie on Sex & the City asks Mr. Big if he's ever been in love and he responds, "Ab-so-fuckin'-lutely" I've been a goner - and a follower -- of sorts. But alas, the watering hole I sought caters to the Silicon Alley set, so it wasn't open, (I guess they're the straight and narrow ones who go to the movies on rainy Sundays). But having had enough of being a psycho-chick, I called the hotline, and was one of the first to arrive at the on-in sometime close to 5 p.m.

Meanwhile, somewhere across town, Tiger's Woody gave up on the trail, went back to a mark she had spotted on her way to the start and quickly found her way to the on-in. Others less fortunate made their way to Union Square, where they got lost and finally called in for an S.O.S, while still others like Mike Bahamonde and Heather made it as far as Stuyvesant Town. In the end, we all managed to make it to the bar, but Heather was the only one who claimed to have actually completed the entire trail (a possible Rosie Ruiz offense if ever I heard one). Still, reports of sunshine and double rainbows came from the field so Dave and Melissa were off the hook for WTOTY, especially since no one is actually sure if there even really was a trail to begin with, and a surprisingly congenial on-in ensued.

In total, Dave Long had to do three down-downs. First for setting the trail, second for not reading Roy's thorough guidelines for setting a trail (which should be on the web site, except for Dave's negligence in posting it), and still another with Heather and I for miscommunication vis-à-vis petty things like correct hash start borough location information on the web and in the write-up. Melissa also did a down-down for her contribution to the lack of trail, while Andrew got a down-down (I'm pretty sure, anyway) in an attempt to train him how to hold his liquor better and Rudy earned the AOTW for offenses committed as hare during the prior week's Sancta Lucia run. Namely, not setting the hotline or marking the start with the on-in location, causing visitors to follow the GGFullMoon trail from two night's prior to a desolate Ellen O'Dee's.

We had no visitors or virgins to salute, abuse or ignore, so we swilled beer and gulped down pizza and enjoyed our small, but high-spirited group of hashers while making fun of a Satanic Santa rendering painted on the bar's entry window and sharing tales of dysfunctional Christmases past. Later, Danny and I got up to our old late-night tricks and made another stop on the way to the subway to an ATM and another bar (I needed a bathroom and another beer, he needed a scotch) and the night got fuzzier and fuzzier from there. On-out.