Night of the Deranged RA

By Shamus O’Pressed

The end of Tai Shue Ha Road West was the venue for run 1666. Not a hard place to find, one might think, but several hashers struggled to do so in one way or another, most notably Penile Dementia (formerly Oranguwank or possibly Oranguwang; a matter of some controversy and heated discussion at run 1665) and his passenger Catch of the Day, who drove to the correct location, found it not to their liking, and spent a happy half hour touring Tai Tong in search of a better place. Meanwhile, not to be outdone in the incompetence stakes, Gunpowder Plod was on his phone busily misdirecting a N2TH3 newbie, “Fiona” (or, conceivably, “Fee Owner”) around the outer precincts of that motorist’s nightmare, Yuen Long.

By 7.45 Eunuch, Mango Groove and the all-important beer had still not arrived. Golden Jelly had retired to her vehicle for a well-earned nap and the other assembled hashers (Plod, Serbian “Spammer” Bomber, Tooth-hurtee, Inflatadate and Shamus O’Pressed) were agitating for a briefing from hare Golden Balls. GM Velcro Lips told him to get on with it and the group hit the trail, plunging straight into some shiggy woodland, just as Eunuch was parking.

Emerging onto the northern arm of the 5km road loop, the trail stuck to the road for several hundred yards before abruptly ascending a rocky slope. A bit of a scramble followed, then some nice trail before rejoining the road higher up. Here those of a wimpy disposition were directed right while rambos went left – an arrangement which caused much indignation among those (mainly Velcro Lips) who remembered Golden Balls’ briefing, in which he had drawn arrows indicating a reverse scenario.

Somewhere around this point, Serbian Bomber contrived to get lost. Meanwhile the rest of the rambos were scrambling up a hill at a brisk pace. Shamus O’Pressed (that’s me), whose torch was rapidly fading, huffed and puffed to keep in touch with the gazelle-like hashers in front of him, but their encouraging cries of “Trail!” got ever more distant and he soon found himself squinting for dimly-lit patches of flour in the silence.

Following a nice bit of downhill ridge-running and a shiggy descent to the Tai Tong – Tai Shue Ha gap, the trail eventually rejoined the road for an extended On Home section. A compact pack of rambos, led by Tooth-hurtee, reached home after about 45 minutes. Shamus trotted in 10 minutes later, and there followed a protracted wait for Serbian Bomber. Appeals by the hare for a search party to be sent out were met with general indifference.

The circle was eventually convened and Velcro led the ritual humiliations of hapless hashers, before handing over to RA Mango Groove, at which point chaos ensued. Possessed by some manic urge to rename everyone in sight, the RA first singled out Tooth-hurtee, who briefly became “Can’t Get it Up” – a reference to his clapped-out old Jag and possibly the shortest-lived name in hash history – before an increasingly deranged Mango wildly insisted that the bemused former Tooth-hurtee be again renamed, this time as “Six-thirty”, or rather, “Luk Dim Boon”. Not content with the level of confusion, the RA rounded on Inflatadate, dubbing him “Oranguwank” – the name recently vacated by Penile Dementia. Proceedings were then further disrupted by the sensational reappearance of Serbian Bomber, running in from the outgoing direction, who barged straight into the circle to ironic cheers, accepted a down-down, and uttered dark mutterings about an ambiguously marked check on the trail.

Order was eventually restored and the hashers consumed (more) beers and tasty hot dogs cooked up by Golden Jelly and Golden Balls.