TVH3 The Words for 30th December 2024

The British Legion, Newton Abbot

Run No. 2056 

 

"The Magnificent Seven + 1" or is it, "And Then There Were Five"?

 

HARE: Beeflicker

 

Who wuz there: Beeflicker, Man-Pig, Piltdown Man, Smellie, Pisswell, Beefy, Pocket Rocket and Melon Picker

 

Circle

The last run of the year always falls between Christmas and New Year. Many Hashers are away, have family commitments or are simply worn out from the Christmas Festivities.

Accordingly, numbers were low which is always a shame when a Hare has set a trail. In fact, Haldon Hash were not running at all on the 30th and AshHash had decided to cancel their Tuesday run as it fell on New Year's Eve.

So, yes, numbers were down. But they were even worse than the 8 listed above. On arriving at the Cricket Field car park at 7.10pm there was only the Hare and one other Hasher present, Piltdown Man.

"Where's Smellie?" I ask.

"She's on a later train".

"Train?"

Tonight's trail was no ordinary trail. It was to be a Walkers' trail only, walking between pubs. The Pig was sent back to his car to get changed out of his Hashing gear and to contemplate an evening of savouring the best in low alcohol beers that money could buy. On the other hand, those that were arriving on foot and by public transport were on a mission to rival that of The Twelve Pubs of Christmas.

Pisswell was present but no Beefy.

"Is Beefy looking after the girls this evening?" I enquire of Pisswell.

"No. I dropped him off at the Edgemoor Hotel and he's running down".

"Nuts" I thought.

And to Melon Picker, "Where's Soapy?"

"At a pantomime".

So, with that, the six of us circled up.

"Are there any announcements?' enquires Piltdown.

"Yes" says the Pig. "Poacher has phoned to advise that next week's Hash is from the Castle Inn, Stoke Gabriel. Also, the following week's Hash (also Hared by Poacher) is almost certainly going to be from The Crown & Sceptre, St Marychurch (TBC)".

And with that we were off.

 

Trail

If last week's trail only had Walkers' and Shorts' options, tonight's had Walkers' as the only option.The trail was marked in blue chalk arrows.

The first pub was The Locomotive. Amazingly, this pub did not have any real ales. They hadn't run out. They just don't serve them. Here we met up with Smellie and Beefilcker distributed pens and a Hash quiz that he had devised. Beeflicker had concocted a short story about a Hash pub crawl but there were missing words from the script. All we had to do was to fill the blanks with a Hasher's name to create a coherent story.

Man-Pig completed the quiz first but hadn't understood the instructions and got 1 out of 10. In a flashback to his schooldays, he was sent away to try again. Pocket Rocket took a full two pubs before completing his. Smellie was being particularly diligent and received full marks with everyone else circa 7 or 8 out of 10.

We moved onto the Cider Bar where Beefy was waiting for us and we all became confused by the term "Bibs". The chalk board listed a selection of draught ciders and then another selection under the heading of "Bibs".

"What are bibs?" I ask the barman. He points to the bank of 5 litre polybins lined up on the shelf.

Mystery solved.

With a full tally of eight, we decided to move straight onto the British Legion. We lost lost Melon Picker and Piltdown on the way as they were going to call it a night. We also temporarily lost Pisswell. She would be running back to the Edgemoor Hotel to collect the car and return for Beefy.

 

Down-Downs

And then there were 5 who entered into the British Legion for a final slurp and a chat.

We agreed that we would pass on the Down-Downs this evening, even though Beeflicker was up for it. Despite, or perhaps because of, the low numbers, Beefy commented on how good it was for everyone to be sat around chatting about nothing in particular. And it was; all really rather convivial.

In the blink of an eye it was time for Smellie to catch her last train back to Teignmouth. Beefy's lift had arrived back in the guise of Pisswell and van so we bade each other "Farewell and a Happy New Year".

 

Next week

Next week's Hash is from The Castle Inn, Stoke Gabriel with Hare Poacher. Check your tide tables or bring a wetsuit!

On-On to next week and a Happy New Year and a prosperous 2025 to one and all MP XXX