Run #408 A Run on the Wild Side

It was to be a night of redemption for hare IR Stupid, whose exploits with long, poorly marked and otherwise incomprehensible trails had become legends to the Gypsies, the hapless hare’s protests notwithstanding. Alas, the signs were not auspicious, as the weather gods took care to piss torrentially on the hare as he diligently set trail, only to zip up the moment the pack began to assemble. Caught along with the hare was Shaggy Dog, trapped in the downpour like the mangy cur he is thanks to his brilliantly planned strategy of arriving at the start a full hour before anyone else arrived. Yet IRS is nothing if not the soul of generosity, offering the rank hasher and his ranker locks not only shelter, but his very last beer. Need more be said? Truly, the gods smiled when IRS was named.

Despite the lingering scent of rain, the sharp chill and the bombed-out greenhouse nearby, a goodly sized pack soon assembled in the lee of MacLaren Park. Even the sharply lower temperatures, however, couldn’t wipe the shit-eating grin from the faces of Dick Chick and Just Craig, who had finally discovered that friction = warmth = a late arrival to the start. D’Anglin Anglin sat wanking quietly in his van, having no other source of friction but his trusty right. Scarlett O’Hairy proved that her best feature can still tempt men, finally dragging along the long-absent Wanker’s Island to join the festivities.

Our trusty facilitators Tongueless and Fits In having sensibly decided to take their time making the perilous journey from Marin, the pack was bereft of spiritual inspiration and simply lurched onto trail, which wound this way and that before making a beeline for the nearest tall hill. Just Matt, winded from nicotine and too many sleepless nights pondering why he had taken so long to start hashing, trailed near the end of the pack, where Sudsuckin’ Bigfoot found him and lashed him onwards. As the trail entered MacLaren Park, however, the wiliness of the hare revealed itself in the form of long stretches between checkpoints with no markings whatsoever. Manhole led an expedition to the far southern edge of the park, and vanished forever into the ‘hood below.

Only when Likes to Lick, having climbed the local observation tower for communion with the powers that be and a handful of animated locals, returned to earth with his revelations and a fresh bag of white powder did the numbed and bewildered pack stagger forward and back onto true trail. Enter the Gerbil grabbed the bag to mark trail for stragglers. No sooner did the first clump touch the earth than a tiny yipping dog bolted from the underbrush, dragging behind it a hideously deformed woman screaming something unintelligible about rat poison and police. Fearing for her mate’s life, Bigfoot scored a resounding punt on the dog, whose breath whistled “Tuuuu….” as it sailed into the woods, its bent and misshapen owner collapsing in a cloud of doggy-poo sacks and wailing about the injustices that right-thinking citizens must suffer.

Various other snares awaited, including an eagle-turkey split that propelled D’Anglin Anglin off into the nether regions of Daly City, but the rest of the pack scented beer and quickly returned to the start. The mulled wine was poured from the Sacred Thermi and dispensed in the form of down-downs to the deserving. Just Dave, freshly returned from Peru and several nights of vomiting in the company of Tongueless, kneeled before the pack for naming, brandishing a bag of fasteners allegedly once required to buck up his penis before he discovered the magic of drink; after close examination of his privates by Peter, himself in need of a good naming, he rose with the name Nutless Sack.

Wanker’s Island demonstrated a talent for drinking teabags from his new shoes, but that wasn’t enough to sate the pack, which soon indulged in an orgy of political incorrectness and discrimination against people of color, those unfortunate enough to be yellow, red or purple. As chaos reigned, IRS declared the on-on-on at a local Thai restaurant and promptly decided to lead his own expedition to barbecue instead. Fortified with rounds of beer and spicy noodles, their absence went almost unnoticed by the rest of the pack until the wankers returned to bogart the remaining beer. On on.