Date: 16/4/2014
Virgin Hare: Racy Tracy (Mentor: Egg & Bacon Pie)
Venue: Prince Maximilian Hotel Prahran
The Royal Edition commemorating the visit of His Royal Highness Prince William Arthur Philip Louis, Duke of Cambridge, Earl of Strathearn, Baron Carrickfergus, Royal Knight Companion of the Most Noble Order of the Garter, Knight of the Most Ancient and Most Noble Order of the Thistle, Personal Aide-de-Camp to her Majesty the Queen. (Surely someone in Lakeside should get the Order of the Thistle or at least have something done to them by a thistle).
Firstly a boring history lesson about the venue. It’s been there since the 1850s, but in the 1870s it was taken over by a Croatian called Antonio Buzolich, who moonlighted as Italian Consul. Antonio, who had a thing for Maximilian, renamed the hotel the Prince Maximilian. He also had the Maximilian Gold Mining Company and the Archduke Maximilian Dalmatian Reef Quartz claim near Moliagul. In the mid-late 19th century Croatia was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Archduke Max was the brother of Emperor Franz Joseph.
At age 22, Archduke/Prince Maximilian was the Commander-in-Chief of the Austrian Navy. (Yes, the Austrian Navy. Why not? Alice Springs has a Surf Life Saving Club!). In 1864, France’s Napoleon lll promoted Prince Max as Emperor of Mexico. The Mexicans were really pleased – Not!!
If anyone is jealous of our Sir GG or our Prince for having a title, feather-duster-hood might be safer. During the Mexican revolution in 1867, Emperor Maximilian was put up against a wall by disgruntled Mexicans and shot dead by firing squad. In 1889 Max’s nephew, Crown Prince Rudolph shot himself and his 17 year old mistress in a murder-suicide. In 1914, Maximilian’s other nephew, Crown Prince Franz Ferdinand was assassinated at Sarajevo, triggering the First World War.
The moral of the story – titles cause revolutions and World Wars.
The theme of princes coming unstuck continued on the run when HRH Prince hit an electric light pole and the pole hit back, only harder. Manly New Zealander that he is, he immediately arose and continued leading the pack. However, he did end up with a swelling on his arm about the size of a Darrell Lea Cherry Dark Chocolate Rocklea Road 180g egg.
It was a large pack with lots of young, very fit visitors. They may be young, fit and fast, but those of us with years of hashing under our belts showed that experience counts for ……nothing really, since the youngsters got back to the pub first. Very swish pub with lots of young professional Gen Ys.
I’m loving the new energy saving trend whereby the hare joins the pack on the run. Virgin hare Racy Tracy and her ‘been-around-the-block-heaps-of-times’ mentor E&B were determined not to lose any of the unusually large pack with Racy shepherding the walkers and the mentor monitoring the runners.
Racy Tracy has raised the bar re drink stop standards. Venue was the front garden of a lovely old house in Sth Yarra with even lovelier mulled wine and an Easter egg hunt. Don’t think we found them all. Wonder if chocolate is good for possums?
A large pack squashed into a small room gives us a circle. You know that $3000 bottle of Grange which caused ex-Premier Barry O’Farrell to have a 3 year blinder so severe that he forgot everything, well Daisy The Cow Udder must have downed a $3.50 cask of that shonky wine he gets from Aldi, because a few times he raised his hand to lay a charge, then, by the time it was his moment in the sun, he’d forgotten the charge and the chargee.
Charges
- Returnees: Deeper, Crabbo, Upper Class Tart, Shit Off A Shovel, Gargoyle.
- Visitors: Kat, Mia, Quicklay, ShuShu.
- Klingon said the run was memorable but he couldn’t remember much.
- SOAS said it was the best run of the year by a virgin hare and awarded it 19.5/21 – the mentor lost 1.5 points because she has lots to learn.
- Special Runs: Astro, Cut Loose, Gringa, Liya. Special mention for Astro who’s clocked up 400 runs in 20 years. If Astro can maintain the pace, he’ll reach Sir GG’s current 1000 record when he is about 95 years old and living in the Black Rock Rest-Home for Retired Gentlefolk. That is, if he can figure out the front door keypad code to escape the Rest-Home – hint, it’s usually the post-code. For Astro to break Sir GG’s record requires Sir GG to hang up his Adidas now, which hopefully he won’t do, because I won’t have anyone to write about (who doesn’t read our emails, and hence, doesn’t see the run reports).
- Prince for pole-dancing on the run.
- Racy Tracy for getting her seasons confused and serving Christmas mulled wine at the Easter drink stop.
- Udder for forgetting his charge.
- Udder for going up, down and around like an erect dangle (wasn’t paying attention so create your own context).
- Sir GG for failing to sign the book as SIR GG.
- Prince for signing himself in the book as HRH Prince.
- SOAS for disagreeing with shortcutting.
- Tracy for making her arrows too small.
- No Balls for running all the way uphill.
- E&B got the Eddie Obeid award for offering shortcutting inducements.
- Cut Loose, UCT and Peanuts for forming a knitting circle.
- Prince and Kat for shortcutting and racing.
- SOAS for making a long winded charge. (He is Sir GG’s lovechild after all.)
- Cheesecake for yawning.
- Liya, Cheesecake and No Balls on a wardrobe charge.
- Nickelby for not recognising returnee, Janet.
Don’t forget Bike Hash in May.
Scribe: Cheesecake