NYCH3 Run# 822 Hares: Basil Ashmore & John O’Connor Start: Old St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Mott St. On-In: Paddy O’Reilly’s, 1^st Ave & 32^ndish Scribe: Dave Long

Another year, another St. Patrick’s Day, which for your humble scribe means another night of avoiding all drinking establishments and letting every amateur drinker in New York crawl out of the woodwork, only to crawl into the gutter later on to puke. If the Russians had ever invaded America, you can bet your ass that they would have chosen to do it on St. Patrick’s Day – they would probably have been welcomed with open arms and all given a complimentary pint of green Guinness on the Pentagon (come to think of it, maybe that would have been a good way to repel an invasion?). Those pesky Greater Gotham hashers had stolen their parent hash’s thunder by having their hash actually on St. Pat’s day instead of two days after it, it having fallen on a Friday this year (fear not folks, only 363 days to go ‘til the next one). I’m not sure how many of them turned up on Sunday as well, but we were certainly honoured with the presence of fellow on-sex and GGFMH3 JM Donkey Dong Troise, scotching rumours that he had been kidnapped by Petra and taken to Germany, so that their imminent sprog could be raised in the true German way and be called Otto or Uwe or something.

It may not have been common knowledge that there was another St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York. Of course this one could have been named after St. Patrick the Elder, and not his more famous offspring, I’m not sure. Anyway, since the arrival of the new cathedral on fashionable 5^th Avenue, the old one on humble Mott St. has probably been largely forgotten about, except by our hares, Basil and John, who chose to start there. I guess “Cardinal” O’Connor does get a bit tired of his 5^th Ave. hangout sometimes. At the start, the Other Irish John (Lynch) displayed his knowledge of all things green by announcing that a shamrock in fact has four leaves and not three. Well John, that all depends on how many Guinness you may have drunk at the time I suppose. I of course arrived just in time to catch the hares loading the last of the bags into the getaway taxi, the pack being long gone. The trail headed south through Soho and then into darkest Chinatown, where I caught up with some pack seemingly stuck at a check, just as the signature on-on cry of Baldwin was heard in the distance. We headed inexorably south, eventually sighting Studgate and Scott also stuck at a check by the court building. For once I lucked out and found the on-trail almost immediately, I guess it’s a measure of the trust people have in my trail finding abilities that no one seemed to listen to my shouts of on. No skin off my nose – suffer at the checks, dudes. By this time, the pack must have been stretched out all over lower Manhattan, as most of them were nowhere to be seen. This could perhaps be explained by the fact that the second half of this LONG trail was almost entirely composed of straight lines and not many checks, allowing the FRBs to leave the rest in the dust. Hey Basil, don’t let that tyrannical little sister of yours boss you into setting long runs (I suspect that John doesn’t get that kind of bossing from Aleks too often).

Ever northwards went the trail, wending it’s way up the East River. Having seen the back of Mickey Mouth weeks ago, I was slightly surprised to see it again in East River Park, she having already returned from the interhash in Oz. The Aussies are a thick skinned bunch, and so it’s difficult to see how MM could have upset them so badly that they threw her out so soon. Knowing Karin’s fondness for closing bars though, my guess is that the local bar owners were protesting too much about never getting any sleep. There was a touching “nice view” mark put down by the hares along the river, which seeing as we had already run five and a half miles by that point, was not half as nice a view as the inside of a bar would have been at that same point in the run. But thanks for the sentiments, guys.

Finally, on-in to Paddy O’Reilly’s, same venue as last year’s pissing-rain affair. Possibly a unique bar in this day and age (in NYC at least) in that it has precisely one beer on tap, Guinness (I’m sure there are barflies out there who will correct me on this), although they will grudgingly give you a bottle of something lighter if you ask nicely. The live band, New Hillbillies On The Block, were already in full swing when we arrived. Musical note: is it easier to play the banjo than the guitar when pissed, because there are fewer strings to worry about? The Cardinal and Basil were safely ensconced at the bar, and could only be budged for their down-downs. No beer until you’d coughed up the readies and paid homage to the Cardinal, said seven Hail Marys etc. Crofty conducted the circle and awarded the Asshole Of The Week award to Ewa for some flying stunt (a la Wickham) performed while on the trail, which resulted in her lovely new hash gloves ($5 a pair, see Ewa) getting a bit holey. Good job she got 500 pairs of them in, so will be able to purchase another pair after pay day. Hash tip of the week: always wear your hash gloves ($5 a pair, see Ewa), even in the hottest weather, as hand protectors for the accident prone.

Oh well. St. Patrick’s is over for another year. Now we can all go back to getting pissed for no reason at all.

On out.