#1168 Christmas Hash 2019

The Sheffield Tap - Captain Morgan.

‘It was bloody Warhorse by the way’ said Prof after last year’s Christmas Hash, I share your pain prof, I share your pain.

And so it was that that an army of famous Sheffield pubs made its way to another famous Sheffield pub ‘The Sheffield Tap’ for the start of the annual fancy dress Christmas run. The usual suspects were already in position in the form of Scotsman’s Pack x 2, The Shoulder of Mutton and The Blind Monkey.

The Shoulder of Mutton and Scotsmans Pack I

The Blind Monkey

Much effort had been made and we saw the good, the bad, the excellent, the clever, the indecipherable, the con artist, ‘oh which pub is that Fast Eddie?’ ‘err…the George, ‘which one pray tell?’, ‘mmm I am sure we’ve ran from a George before’ [Tideswell actually - Ed], and so the list continued. The gruesome, the twosomes, the ‘Oh no we’ve worn the same outfit’, the ‘I’ve been making this since last Christmas and thoroughly enjoyed myself’ and so on. We were bright as the Rising Sun, festive, cheesy and in some cases slightly twisted. To pick a winner would be too tall a task.

The George and Norfolk Arms

For the uninitiated the format changes slightly for the Christmas Hash, the distances are shorter, there are frequent beer stops and last night we had a couple of helpful guiding hares in the form of Scotsman’s Pack 1 and The George.

After a fairly lengthy pre-hydration session in The Tap we set off into the city to wreak havoc. The landlord was visibly relieved to see the back of The Cave-n-Dish, who had thus far, quite efficiently blocked the entrance to the loos.

The Cave-n-Dish

First stop was the escalator at the new cinema on the Moor, The Minus Arms and her spouse ‘Frog & Parrot’ raced up the escalator the wrong way (incidentally Madj brought New Nick, last seen in Arbourthorne, who also joined in the fancy dress fun). Phil pipped Madj to the top by a whisker or 7 steps to be precise.

The 'Minus' Arms

Thereafter it was back into quiet anonymous streets towards our first Watering Hole, ‘The Devonshire Cat’. The fairly groovy Gen-Z clientele hardly looked up from their glasses as our soft parade entered the pub. There followed an interesting conversation about ‘Fox Tail Plugs’ between the Fox and Duck and the Frog and Parrot, google it, please, the plug not the conversation.

The Fox & Duck (no tail fortunately)

Two of the Three Merry lads had to be sat down, presumably to get their breath back, whilst the third knocked back a beverage. It was revealed that the Moon had made her own Stoney Middleton without help from the kids. All the while one of the Holly Bush twins tried and succeeded to sign up to the Hathersage Hurtle.

The Three Merry Lads

The Moon at Stoney Middleton

The Royal Oak was missing her Mincer, who would have no doubt dressed as the Butchers Arms if it was not for a bout of the man flu. She was accompanied by the multi-identity Millstone or possibly Grindstone depending on your preference. The Quiet Woman was seen quietly up-skirting one of the Scotsman’s Packs who appeared to have covered his modesty with his wife’s satin slip.

The Hollybush and The Grindstone...or maybe the Millstone

The Scotsmans pack boasting 'non-traditional' kilt underwear

Not so slowly but quite surely, we all supped up and headed off towards the next venue. In the spirit of the circular economy or possibly alchemy in this case Shunter had recycled his 2017 train into a horse and rattled along as the Horse and Jockey. I will give 1-10 odds that said contraption won’t make another appearance.

After some arsing about on Devonshire Green, without much help from the Ramblers Inn who was suitably attired with a map and compass, the hares simply informed where the next pub was, the Bath Hotel. Our numbers gave the pub the feeling of a Saturday evening but without the bar staff to match, that said our man there managed to remain composed and serve us all. Special mention to newcomer Seth (aka Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese) who felt obliged to come on a second run, dressed as a cheese, in case we shunned him in future, fear not we need the numbers, all comers welcome however frequent or infrequent!

The navigationally challenged Ramblers

The Cheshire Cheese

Under the bright lights of the Bath Hotel the Norfolk part of the map on Gwilym’s costume could finally be made out and we had the Norfolk Arms, apparently even a group of Three Blind Monkeys would have guessed what it was…map reading was never my strength! The horse and Jockey tried to usher us all to a back room but was barked away by a small dog and a grumpy owner. I seem to remember a live firing exercise of The Robin Hood’s bow and arrow was started, by The Holly Bush 2 and that signaled that it was time to move on.

As dangerous as he looks!

Off into the night we trundled, precise memories of the events begin to blur around this point, so I’ll just make a couple of things up... I cleverly established that the route would be towards the curry house and the pack followed loyally. We stopped for a kind of ‘running silhouetted against the white university building’ photoshoot, initiated by the Quiet Woman, not sure how that worked out but we all seemed intent on making it work.

Next stop was the Dog and Partridge, this proved to be tricky given that there was another pub before it, aptly named something completely different to lower the risk of confusion. Thankfully the hare (Scotsman’s Pack 1) sensed our increasing degrees of inebriation and positioned himself outside the wrong pub, like the unlikeliest bouncer in the world, and ushered us along to the right place.

Once inside the D&P a rather insightful chap managed to guess most of the pubs portrayed by us, his delight at our costumes yielded a vague promise of joining us in the new year….we shall see!

And so we came to the end of the liquid segment of the evening and began to focus on the nourishment, Hashers had suitably starved themselves for the feast and were more than ready for it. The restaurant arranged a table right down the middle for us, atop the table were Hash Treats a plenty, whilst underneath three over excited hashers were caught spelunking together.

The hare had ordered our food by hash handle which proved confusing as we had become used to our new pub names, some of the names seemed to amuse the staff anyway. A rare un-fancy-dressed, unnamed hasher in the form of Mathew Daniel was spotted, all manner of likely stories were told explaining his lack of a costume. Think we can solve the naming problem very soon. With that we broke bread and the feast began.

Epilogue
With full stomachs, stretched legs and overworked livers we concluded another great year of hashing (but for the Christmas Holiday hashes being touted about). Really great turnout and great organization by the hares.

There was a late call and limited attendance to the afterparty at the Cobden view, which was duly regretted the following day.

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year and On On,
The Cobden View

Cob - Den - View....Geddit??

P.S. What do you say to a Hasher dressed as a Human sized parrot?
‘Nice Costume mate’
‘Cheers’
Extract from ‘Prof’s little chat with someone he met on the way to the Christmas hash’