Run	Date	Hare(s)	Description	MapRef	1:50000	1:25000	1:10000	More
860	2017-01-01 11:00	Hairbrush & Old Faithful - The Real Hangover Hash	Felpham - Hairbrush House	SU959002

New Year’s Day arrived damp and cool but a good crowd gathered in Hairbrush’s garden looking forward to a run to begin undoing the Christmas over-indulgencies. We welcomed returnees Shades and Godiva. The crowd should have been swelled with Prancer & Vixen’s family party but sadly they had instead had to take Vixen’s mother to hospital – we all wish her a speedy recovery.

The pack set off northwards through the housing estate quickly getting spread out in total confusion following some teasing falsies. This was apparently compounded by the hares laying mis-directing arrows at times. Kinky, riding a bike because of some injury, took on the job of rounding up the strays.

It was 1st January not 1st April, but Snake Charmer and Dag decided to play a prank on Bambi and The Ref pretending a falsie mark was a fish-hook and succeeded in inducing them to continue on the false trail – they should know it’s a dangerous thing to play such a prank on the JM!

By now the rain had stopped and we had crossed the Bognor by-pass twice and were entering the new Barratt Homes development at St Mary’s Place. Here Fate took her revenge on Snake Charmer and Dag catching them on a real fish-hook, along with Bambi and Dr Blood.

Brushing down the western edge of Felpham we came to the Fox (but no drink stop was arranged here), then we stopped for photos and the inevitabe Bambi joke in the Old Rectory Gardens. On we went weaving along the side roads parallel to the sea, and on in through King George V Recreation Gardens just as it started drizzling again.

Into the circle Bambi called Olive Oyle and Popeye for having done the park run before the hash; next Canman who refused to pick up a large stash of empty cans simply because it was a scramble to reach them (he did get a sizeable haul anyway). Bambi condemned the hares for laying misleading arrows, but commended them for laying a precision hash with falsie marks occasionally just a few feet away from the next legal blob reached by an alternative route. 2 Ferrets Fighting, Splasher and Flash were admonished for short-cutting. But, of course, the hash-it inevitably went jointly to Snake Charmer and Dag for their ill-considered prank.

Bambi briefly delivered a review of the year’s hashing: recalling the loss of fellow hashers The Doc and The Gnu, and remembering the highlight of the year being the joint run (848) with the Isle of Wight H3.

Fellow JM Old Faithful thanked the hosts Hairbrush and Carol for their hospitality and the wonderful food, and he thanked Spiderman for his continuing work as webmaster, Flash for continuing as hash cash, and Kinky for continuing as hare raiser and last year’s scribe. Kinky was awarded the Hash-it of the Year. [I’m very honoured.]

Finally Old Faithful announced the names of the JMs for the coming year – Hairbrush and 2 Ferrets Fighting. Congratulations to them. Hairbrush made a short speech thanking the outgoing JMs, before his major responsibility for the day – running the time-honoured raffle!

On On! Kinky