Salutations,

We entered the second Hash of 2022 much as we completed the first one, dismayed and disappointed. I see no reason to rehash last week’s Hash, let’s rather attempt to rationalize this week’s outing.

 Winter is truly here. The palm tree in your front yard no longer flowers, one of the Japanese Maples on Pacific planted a discarded leaf on your head. It’s dark at your favorite watering hole when you arrive after work.

This brings us to this week’s trail and, more specifically, lead hare Courtesy Flush. Courtesy Flush, in his multitude of physical manifestations, has been with Surf City almost seven years. He has settled into our Hash much the same way as would an unemployed cousin who visits without a fixed departure date settles in. You will remember Courtesy Flush’s last excursion onto the sand, we almost lost dBASED(not a great loss) and Junk Puncher(a truly great loss). So now, in his steadfast refusal to learn from previous grievous errors, even when he was the one to commit them, he again saw fit to drag the gang through the sand. Maybe, in his warped little half-mind, he envisioned events transpiring differently in the dark. On that note, he WAS correct, most of us were unable to even find the WATER, let alone the damn trail.

But let us examine events in the order in which they occurred, there will be plenty of opportunity the thrash the hare in the future.

We started pleasantly enough at old friend the Boardwalk Bowl, albeit outside this time rather than in the warm interior. It wasn’t that cold(yet) so everyone was fine with that.  

After an unsatisfying bout with Snake Me Anywhere and her unsettling version of Instructions of Trail, the pack settled back into socializing and pondering the enigmatic question: Where the hell was Courtesy Flush? The general consensus was the cheeky hare was pre-laying but, as evidenced by later events, this extra time did not enhance trail quality one iota.

After the passage of the preordained time allotment, Broke Bench Mountain issued a call for Circleup for Introductions and heard from: TIMMY!!, dBASED, Occasional Rapist, Dicky Wacker, Ska-Skank Redemption, Cold Smegma Kamikaze, Steamy Baanorrhea, Cum You Will Not, Chippin’ Ballz, Cumz Out My Nose, Dung-Fu Grip, Puff the Magic Drag Queen and the usual compliment of four-legged hounds, that being Junk Puncher and Spot’d Dick. On-out!

The pack progressed on-right down Beach Street to our first stop at a Song Check outside the bathrooms at the foot of the Wharf. That proved serendipitous as our singing voices sent more than one tourist to the toilet. Then the trail took the troops down the steps to the Main Beach and here is where the true mystery began. Courtesy Flush had stated marks would be placed in the sand keeping the clan on the straight and narrow along the beach. Well, when it’s too dark to see brilliant white flour, it’s way too damn dark to see flimsy little sticks protruding a scant few inches above the sand. Long story short, the presence of the San Lorenzo River eventually funneled everyone on-up and over the river on the pedestrian bridge. No one drowned or was washed out to sea in other words. 

Okay, now we’re on-up to East Cliff Drive and are heading down to Three Princes Park, the perfect setting for a scenic Beer Check. Alas, it was not to be, we curved on-left bypassing the park and took off for the Museum of Natural History, colloquially called the Whale Museum due to the large concrete whale in the yard. We of course were not allowed to play on it, the cruel hare-pair turned us away from the whale and then on-right on Forbes Street, on-right onto Seabright and then on-left onto Atlantic Avenue.  Not far along, a Turkey/Eagle split sent the less-stupid amongst us on-right. I admit a morbid curiosity in what the e-vile hare-pair planned for the Eagles so I foolishly forged ahead.

The Eagles took Atlantic until it died at the former location of Aldo’s and were then pointed on-right onto the harbor jetty. Partway out to the lighthouse, what proved to be the last mark of the evening, a large hare arrow pointed the pod on-right onto Seabright Beach. That proved to basically be the end of this trail. If there truly were any more of the small markers placed by the hares, no one I spoke with ever saw them. Flour was non-existent. Many of the Eagles, yours truly included, were saved by hashers who saw their ghostly flashlights scouring the beach in search of anything recognizable or, at the very least, some way to get the hell off this desert wasteland of sand. I was rescued by Dung-Fu Grip and escorted to safety. Beer Check was staged at what is colloquially called the Third Avenue Stairs.

 

After the conclusion of our business here, we meandered farther along Seabright Beach, mercifully on East Cliff Drive rather than on the sand, and planted ourselves at a fire provided by our hares. It was here Dung-Fu Grip convened Religion. I spent most of Religion stuffing pizza down my pipes and became highly disinterested in talking notes pertaining to down-downs awarded. I didn’t really cared what happened to any of those people anyway. The only one I truly remember is the awarding of a patch to Snake Me Anywhere for the (somewhat) successful completion of her tenth haring for us and I only remember that one because I had to hand the patch to the RA. Oh, yeah, the hares were called up as a pair as well but I’m certain I need not tell you their trail was thoroughly reviled. After this, the RA dismissed the pack but, as the Beermeister had not gotten around the closing the trough yet, the mob loitered for as long as they could mooch off the the trough. I will tarry no longer though and call for an end to this Trash.

 

The preceding was a factual accounting of actual events though possibly not as they actually occurred. One should never allow the facts to stand in the way of a good story.

By Special Appointment of His Royal Majesty ‘G’, this Hash Trash has been compiled and printed by permission of no one other than the author at Santa Cruz, Ca., or elsewhere if need be, on this, the eleventh day of January in the year of our Hash two-thousand twenty-two.

Submitted with all respect due,

Puff

the

Magic Drag Queen

Surf City H3 Scribe