The Wickford Hollow Weenie Hash
(or: The Witches of Wickford Hash).

Run: #861 October 28, 2002
Hare: Basket Boom Boom (Madame Blavatsky)
CoHare: Tinker (Kassandra)
Scribe: The Slasher Dr W.H.O. (Hecate)
Location: Oakhill Tavern, Dunsinane, Wickford (Eastwick), RI.
Weather: Clear, cold as a witch’s teat.
Present: Bondo Jovi (Morgan Le Fay), WIPOS (Aleister Crowley), Oozing SD (Astarte), Summer’s Eve SYB (Morgause), EverReady (Samantha Stevens), KNO (Darren), PW (Sabrina), Ben (Graymalkin), Jake (Paddock), Zoe (Pyewacket).

The Run:

This is a tale of wickedness and foul sorcery. It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.  A tale of a hash to celebrate All Hallows Eve, three full days early at the Feast of St. Jude (Patron of Lost Causes).  The regulars gathered at the Oakhill Tavern, at Dunsinane Hill south of Wickford, near the witching hour of 6:30 in a cold and dark night. Their dress reflected the unholy nature of their gathering. Bewigged, begown’d, be-ukuleled and benighted they met at the dark void of the parking area. Truck drivers pulling in to take advantage of the tavern’s fare looked askance at the group. One said: "What are these so wither'd and so wild in their attire, that look not like the inhabitants of th' earth and yet are on 't?" God alone knew.

The hare in black and gold, the cohare with platinum locks called the hashers to order and said:

“Scale of dragon, tooth of wolf,
Witches' mummy, maw and gulf
Of the ravin'd salt-sea shark,
Root of hemlock digg'd i' the dark,

Liver of blaspheming Jew,
Gall of goat, and slips of yew
Silver'd in the moon's eclipse,
Nose of Turk and Tartar's lips,
Finger of birth-strangled babe
Ditch-deliver'd by a drab,

‘Tis come upon your final hour
You’ll be lucky if you find flour
Gnash your teeth, and weep and wail
It will not help you find the trail!
Turn north then mark west 'tis showing,
And stand not upon the order of your going,
But go at once.
If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well it were done quickly.”
The hares stood, cold and merciless.

Bondo said: "Come all you spirits that tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here.” Dr WHO replied: “Fill me, from the crown to th' toe, top-full of direst cruelty; make thick my blood!” WIPOS rejoined: “Stop up the access and passage to remorse, that no compunctious visitings of nature shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between the effect and it.” The hares sneered. This was too much. EverReady shook her head, saying: “Come to my woman's breasts, and take my milk for gall, you murthering ministers, wherever in your sightless substances you wait on nature's mischief.” KNO adjusted his/her brassiere, saying: "I hope you bastards didn't put the Beer Check too far from here." The hares laughed, a cold sound without mercy. And then they were off.

Trail did indeed lead north on Rt 1 briefly, then left into a neighborhood where numerous checks had the hashers sore perplexed. Quoth Oozing: “ Ah Basket! I grant him bloody, luxurious, avaricious, false, deceitful, sudden, malicious, smacking of every sin that has a name.” PW replied: “ Do you doubt the deceit of the hares? Away, and mock the time with fairest show; false flour must hide what the false heart doth know.” Bondo said: "F*ck this!" Finally, flour was found leading west then south into the dark forests of Birnam Wood.

A short distance along the banks of Belleville Pond were traversed with Oozing in the lead and Dr WHO and PW following. They came upon the origins of the Annaquatucket River. PW looked at the crossing and said: “Is this a fish-ladder that I see before me, the handle toward my hand? Come, let me cross thee! I have thee not and yet I see thee still.” The hare said: "Be thou like the anadromous fish, if thou wouldst find the Alewife and/or reach the beercheck."  Dr WHO passed him through the water, saying: “PW! Wouldst thou live a coward in thine own esteem, letting “I dare not” wait upon “I would,” like the poor cat I’ th’ adage?” Bondo said: "This hare's a f*ckin' a**hole!" They crossed the raging waters as the others caught up, much to their regret.

Trail led west, with many a false pass undoing our band of hashers as they crossed between Belleville Pond and Secret Lake. To Ryan Park they ran. A Field Hockey match was in progress, with fourteen year old Valkyries in mortal combat engaged. But not all. For two had crept beyond the fields, by a bridge, perchance to partake of the fruit of the hop, the barley or of the insane root/weed. They sat in the wood carefree. But suddenly, like the rugged Russian bear, the arm'd rhinoceros, or the Hyrcan tiger, Oozing ran to their hiding place. The sight of an obvious relative of Osama Bin Laden, dressed in a Catholic schoolgirl's skirt, with a headlamp had them in terror. One said: "Were such things here as we do speak about? Or have we eaten on the insane root that takes the reason prisoner?" The other said: " Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible to feeling as to sight? Or art thou but a hasher of the mind, a false creation proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?"  Oozing replied: "More will follow. Be lion-mettled, proud and take no care. This hash shall not be over until Great Birnam Wood to high Dunsinane Hill shall come against the hares."

The dread trail led west then, and with many falsies turned north on a gas pipeline parallel to Route 4. Oozing led, with cries of: "On On! And damn'd be him that first cries "Hold, enough!" On they went, the night dark and dank around them. A light fog formed. In the rearguard, EverReady and KNO felt great foreboding. KNO said: "Fair is foul, and foul is fair. We hover through the fog and filthy air!"  "Do not despair," said EverReady. " Come, thick night! And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell, that my keen torch see not the flour it shows, nor heav'n peep through the blanket of the dark, to cry, On On!"  Bondo cried: Ben, you f*ckin' sh*thead! Stop humpin' Jake!"

Soon a falsie led Oozing fair astray and the Slasher took the traces around the head of Belleville Pond to encounter a circle with a "BN"! "O," quoth Dr WHO, "my plenteous joys, wanton in fulness, seek to hide themselves in drops of beer!" He encountered a woman, the landowner, the host of the BC, a cobbler who was ill prepared for the sight of a 220lb man in a white nightie. "Avaunt and quit my sight!" she said. "Let the earth hide thee! Thy bones are marrowless, thy blood is cold; thou hast no speculation in those eyes which thou dost glare with!" "O, excuse me!" said Dr WHO. The other hashers arrived in pairs and alone. The hostess looked puzzled at Bondo and the crowd and said: "You should be women, and yet your beards forbid me to interpret that you are so." Finally, when KNO came full-breasted from the glen, all were present for Trinity IPA from a five-gallon jug in the parking area behind a house owned by the rump-fed ronyons of North Kingston.

They drank deep of the barley, and made merry with songs of ill repute (and misbegotten harmonies accompanied on ukulele by SESYB). The hare astoundingly remained fully clothed. When queried about this variance, he said: "Marry, sir, drink may be said to be an equivocator with lechery: it makes him and it mars him; it sets him on, and it takes him off; it persuades him, and disheartens him; makes him stand to, and not stand to; in conclusion, equivocates him in a sleep, and, giving him the lie, leaves him." "What the f*ck are you talking about?!" said Bondo. They were soon off again.

The trail backtracked briefly, and then led north to a plaza with a Wal-Mart. All was chaos from this point on. The lead pack of Oozing, Dr WHO and WIPOS milled about in confusion. Said WIPOS: " When shall we three meet again, in thunder, lightning, or in rain?"  Oozing answer'd: " When the hurlyburly's done, when the hash is lost and run." Finally, trail was found leading back to the woods at the left of the Wal-Mart, to an old railroad grade, northwest into the dark. The shouts and whistles of the leaders were not sufficient, however, and by the time they had reached the Amtrak rails, Bondo, PW, EverReady and KNO were far behind. But WHO, Oozing and WIPOS ran onto the deadly rails, at the mercy of the hare.

But where was SESYB? She had claim'd injury by mountain bike, and sought some sweet oblivious antidote to cleanse the stuffed bosom of the perilous stuff which weighs upon the heart. Thus she secretly bargained with the cohare to take a ride and to nap in the truck going to the second BC. While resting in th' cab she thought she heard a voice cry "Sleep no more! The hare does murder sleep."-the innocent sleep, sleep that knits up the ravell'd sleave of care…" Her guilt preyed upon her , but she consoled herself, thinking: "That which hath made them drunk hath made me bold. I will not fear the hashit 'till Birnam Forest come to Dunsinane."

Half led by hare, the lead trio of weird sisters: Oozing, Dr WHO and WIPOS turned left, with Ben and Jake also, off the railroad to encounter the cohare and SESYB in a truck laden with new-mown hay specially taken from the woods of Birnam. Beer was proffered and accepted. The hare said: " Be large in mirth; anon we'll drink a measure the table round." They waited for the rest to arrive. In vain. For Bondo, circling aimlessly at Wal-Mart, saw the time slipping away. He decided in a trice and advised PW, EverReady and KNO: "Light thickens and the crow makes wing to the rooky wood. Now spurs the lated traveller apace to gain the timely inn." He said that he knew the best way back. KNO doubted, saying: " Yet do I fear thy nature. It is too full o' th' milk of human kindness to catch the nearest way." They headed back to Dunsinane and the Oakhill Tavern the long way, by road, forsaking the beer check ahead.

At the beer check, Basket the hare screwed his courage to the sticking place, and decided to retrace and find the lost hashers. 'Twas agreed to drive the unholy trio and SESYB to Wal-Mart, where the hare could be retrieved, withal after rescuing the wanking DFLs. Off he went into the night. Homeowners along his path threw open windows at his noise and called out: " What's the business, that such a hideous trumpet calls to parley the sleepers of the house? Speak, speak!" But th' hare would not see the others again, 'till Birnam wood had come to Dunsinane. He rejoined the hayride and they drove on into the black night.

At Oakhill Tavern, the hours drew on apace and PW, fearing the approach of the witching hour, drove off, vowing: " How is't with me when every hash appals me? To feed were best at home; from thence, the sauce is meat to ceremony: hashing were bare without it." The others waited. EverReady spied a movement on the road. "Look toward Birnam," she cried. "Anon methought the wood began to move!" "Liar and slave!" said KNO. "No f*cking way!" said Bondo. The moving grove came down the road to reveal the hashers hayride, and all debarked to join the circle. 

They moved across a fence into a field bearing signs: "Do not feed the horses or hashers!" The hare and cohare took the center of the ring, and the hare tried to divert attention, saying: