NYCH3 Run #850

September 20, 2000

Hares: Crazy Bob and Non-British Dave O’Donnell

On-In: Tobacco Road

Scribe: Heather Malloy

It must be one of those rare, cosmic conjunctions of mysterious stellar forces that has been amplifying the significance of minor events lately. Or maybe just the chance collision of the Olympics, an election, and a dive in the NASDAQ. Whatever the cause, we’ve seen attack ads, attack debates, attacks on excessively high P/E ratios, attacks on drug use by athletes, and attack hash trails. However, as the season of forgiveness and compassion approaches, (that would be the week between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur to those of you who don’t know what I am talking about), I will have to take my mother’s advice and be mindful of hurt feelings at every turn, to say nothing if I have nothing nice to say, and to always look for the positive in every situation. For example, last Wednesday, we all went to the start, made pleasant chitchat, ran a lovely trail, indulged moderately in the finest microbrews, and parted on the best of terms before the 11 o’clock news. On-out.

Ha, if I actually heeded my mother’s advice, would I have wound up a hasher? But, it was with her counsel not completely scorned that I found myself contemplating the seven cardinal virtues while on trail last Wednesday night. OK, it was actually predicated by the airing of the movie “Seven” on network television, and a friend’s question about whether a reflexive to the seven deadly sins existed. And I wasn’t really contemplating so much as trying to remember what they were, while coincidentally seeing more than a few exercised on trail. But on with the subject at hand, the run.

A mid-sized crowd gathered at the start at 42^nd and 9^th, dodging hordes of commuters trying to get to Port Authority while patiently awaiting instructions from the hares. Crazy Bob and Dave showed up looking suspiciously spotless, and explained that the trail was set in flour and chalk, and included a rainbow check to avoid excluding anyone. Spotting a bar called “Dave’s” near the start, the possibility of an A-to-A gave everyone a bit of hope that they wouldn’t get completely lost on trail, though not enough hope to leave quarters behind.

We set off north up 9^th Avenue for a bit, then headed east into the theater district. After a bit of running back and forth between the avenues, and seeing more tourists than one thinks can actually exist on an island, we came to the rainbow check right in front of some sort of outdoor musical appreciation thingie. Influenced by the captive audience, the inspiration of the Sydney games, and a resurgence of all things 80’s, Pat chose this moment to burst into a rendition of Olivia Newton-John’s “Physical”, complete with a lovely dance routine. I was especially impressed that she even had the headband to match. Of course, the rest of the pack missed this spectacle, as they were off industriously looking for trail. Or so I presume, as no one called “on”. Eventually, we just ran off in the same direction as everyone else, and found trail on the other side of the block. More avenue-to-avenue running followed, eventually heading up 6^th to Central Park. Imprudently, the hares had set the trail INTO the park, not remembering that it would certainly be dark by the time we reached this portion of the trail. We had faith in our hares, however, and followed trail right in, knowing that no one could possibly set a trail in Central Park this time of year and not keep to the lighted portions. As is often the case when one has faith in common sense, we were wrong. The trail immediately veered off the path and into a very dark and rocky patch, prompting a discussion of the Nike commercial featuring Suzy Favor and the chainsaw murderer. We all got out without being hacked to bits, and followed trail back west and south. Eventually, we reached check #2 at 60^th and West End, and quickly solved it heading south. Ten blocks down, we came upon Dave, practicing his one act of charity for the year in the form of a water-and-wine check. By now we knew it was an A-to-A, and followed the marks back down to 41^st and 9^th. In all, a pretty long trail with very few checks, but even fewer nasty surprises. A pleasant surprise was that the on-in was not Dave’s, but Tobacco Road, a new on-in locale.

And a pretty goodun, too, from the looks of things. Lots of good beers on tap made up for the lack of pitchers, and a rare treat was a dearth of surly locals, plus a friendly bartender. They even have a little side room that was the perfect size for bag storage and semi-public changing. Oh, and the Olympics were on TV instead of baseball. Yipee! The only complaint this scribe heard was a lot of coughing after a few intrepid souls actually dared to smoke some of the cheap cigars proffered to go along with the tobacco theme. Following some beer sampling and greasy pizza scarfing, JMs Gilbert and Trunfio gathered the troops for down-downs.

Pat “Physical” Cuff was mollified somewhat after last year’s alcohol poisoning by the down-down awarded to DB2 for hanging on to the WROTY title. Then, the hash’s version of “Dumb and Dumber” came up to drink for their trail. Two ‘first in’ down-downs were given to Mike Murphy and Sarah as a promotion for hash gender equity. American Dave 2 got one for ordering a glass of Chablis upon arrival at the bar. Lesley and Pat drank for outdoing themselves at the Philly half over the weekend. Rick, one resident of the “set one foot in this house and you’ll do a down-down for something” apartment drank for forgetting co-resident Junior’s birthday, and of course Junior “it is usually me doing the down-down” drank for turning twenty one. Ewa practiced her chugging skills after forcing everyone to take a very important NASS AGM flier that did not actually contain any information about the event. The Cardinal drank for something about not having his new bride with him, or maybe something else entirely. [This is according to Peter’s notes, I don’t recall having seen him there.] Timmy, who arrived at the start in a taxi, and then compounded his gaffe by immediately whipping out a cell phone to call the hotline, did a down-down with Christy, who was also guilty of flagrant cell phoning at the start. Even more mysterious than their mutual predilection for mobile telephony was the fact that they arrived at the on-in all but holding hands. And finally, AOTW went to John Burke for somehow getting his senior citizen self carded at the most recent Full Moon.

Usually, after everyone and their dog gets a down-down, things wind down. Or I just go home and don’t notice. But in this case, the party was just getting started, or so I hear, as I did go home right away, accidentally stealing a cab from under DB2’s nose (sorry Dave). Reports included stories of Christine doing backwards body shots on the bar, Crazy Bob doodling on the floor, and Junior stealing Christy away from Timmy’s clutches. I am not at liberty to reveal any more, but it seems as though a number of hashers are warming up for marathon-weekend on-ins by throwing away all semblance of chastity… On out.