Gone flat

Long run (blue) 6.4k. Timed at about 1 hour. Range: (according to Google Earth) 16m - 42m above sea level. Total ascent (according to Garmin) 41 meters. Short run (green): 4.3m timed at about 1 beer under 1 hour (according to R2D2).
A small but meaningless turnout sampled the runs, judging the long run to be lacking a hill. Stick Insect noted the inability of the natives to align their drainage channels in the correct direction, and Yardstick found the terrain to be less than satisfactorily horizontal, so went off and did the Gan Yao run which amazingly kept him mostly ahead of the paper-bound front runners. The short run was judged to be hot.
The hare has taken all these criticisms in the positive spirit in which they were intended and will put it all right next week! (or the week after... or the week after that... or the week after that.as we have no hares for the foreseeable future).

Flat! Flat! Flat!

With memories of last week's sunset ascent still fresh in some minds, this week's hare is aiming to bring a tear to the eye of every Lincolnshire lad as he attempts to break the record for the lowest point ever on an SH3 run and the minimum ever total ascent. But there will be plenty of running and some gorgeous trails that "we've never run before". (Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!)
Details are:
Songkhla Hash House Harriers run #1710, Saturday, March 29, 2014, 4:30 p.m.
Hares: Egghead and Haram
Misdirections: From the Kao Saeng intersection, take the old Yala road for 8k and turn right before Ban Dan School for 1.5k to the run site on the left.
Map for Sunday's HH3 run below which will be from the same site as last weekend's highly successful Sex Printer birthday run. Hares seem to be Sex of the Man (the real thing, not the wannabee in the smog) and Sex Somethingorother
Finally, for the Hash intellectualati, this month's quiz nite has been postponed for a week and will now take place at the Office Bar on Friday, 4th April. More details next week but hopefully this will mean that the full power of the Hash team will be available to do battle with the might of Songkhla's mental elite, not to mention with the quiz master who is....

Runs this weekend

This weeks SH3 run is a mini-outstation run in Sadao courtesy of Buk Toy and Sex Sprinter (map above). There will be two runs, the A to B, SH3 run which will be at the normal time of 4:30 p.m. and a B to C, Hatyai Full Moon H3 run which will take place pretty quickly after the end of the SH3 run. Details will become apparent tomorrow. For those intending to stay overnight, there will be a covered communal sleeping area at the main site (possibly the C site) where the aprѐs run party will take place. To accommodate this, everyone will be asked to help carry the food, beer etc from the point at which cars can be parked (possibly the A site), since the party site is not accessible by car. If you want to enjoy the comfort of your own tent you will probably have to pitch it adjacent to the car parking area as there are no suitable camping sites other than the communal sleeping area at the party site.

For the HFMH3 run, normal stuff applies: bring a handlight, and contributions of food would be very welcome. Beer will be free courtesy of SH3 and HFMH3, but if anyone wants to give the hares a birthday present the odd extra slab/bottle never goes amiss!

The HH3 run on Sunday will be in Hatyai, not Sadao. Map below. For those coming from Songkhla, take the New Hatyai road from the Ko Yo intersection for about 9k and turn left (at the bottom of the hill after the True Moves tower) then go for less than 1k and turn left by the hash sign. If coming from Hatyai, the route on the new road will involve going past the turn off for about 1.5k and doing a U turn but the run site is also accessible from the old road by turning left at Nam Noi for about 6k when the sign for the run site will be on the right.

Small expectations realised

Long run: 6k, max. elevation: 222m; total ascent: 264m; Sex Sprinter timed it at 70 mins.  Short run: 4k, max. elevation 87m, total ascent about 60m. Time unknown but all the short runners were in before the first long runner arrived. Gan Yao run: length about 20k, total ascent about 28,000 feet, time: long enough for search parties to be despatched. Beer consumption: moderate to heavy. What's new?

HH3: No news is good news

Sex Printer's natural modesty prevents him from naming himsef as hare, we hope, but the illustration would suggest that Sunday's run will be very worthwhile going to....

Small expectations

Not to put too finer point on it, we've had a number of fairly epic runs recently, culminating in last Sunday's HH3 run at which even the hares seemed to be slightly amazed at just how long it turned out to be. So Saturday will see a return to more modest aspirations with a run guaranteed to be in the region of 6k and about an hour, with the short run being, well, shorter and not involving an ascent of the foothills of Everest.

Details are: 

Songkhla Hash House Harriers' run #1708, Saturday March 15th 2014, 4:30 p.m.

Hares: Egghead, Peppered Pussy, White Meat, Harram and Ma Mick

Misdirections: From the Ko Yo intersection take the old Hatyai road for 4k and turn left for 5.2k then left opposite the entrance to Ban Borogam for 500m to the run site by the big sala.

Sunday's HH3 run will be from the run site opposite Sai Kao Resort: From the Ko Yo intersection take the old Hatyai road for 4.7k and turn left for 6k then left for about 4.5k and look for a sign on the right. The hares, if we are lucky will include Sex Sprinter. If we're not it might be better not to ask!

If halal piggies could fly...

...then all runs would be like yesterday's Despite some notable absentees, moderate sized packs enjoyed  the long run (blue-green-blue), 8.3k, total ascent, 363m, maximum height, 240m, and the short run (all blue) - 4.0k (or a bit more according to R2D2's GPS), total ascent 217m, maximum height 220m. Starting from a novel position West of our normal haunt on the concrete road, the hares perversely set out south-eastwards back towards the main road up the hill before turning West along the ridge and following mostly familiar tracks clockwise around the top of the hills before some funny stuff in the final valley and home in about 1 hr 20 mins. The short run, which seemed to collect, one or two of the long runners on the way, mostly returned after the long run, and looked remarkably untraumatized by the length and ascent more familiar to a moderate long run. Even Itchy Bitchy seemed to still have a spring in her step and it was the long runners who seemed faintly fazed by the slightly longer than normal trip they had made.
Subsequent events included the welcoming of Pim who may have been on her second run, but what the hell! And the naming of Tata (Hot Buns) and Ting, alias Sex Tour X from HH3 (Ting Tong). Stumps were drawn at close to 8 o'clock when the beer ran out, generously supplemented by Soft Cock who admitted to an outbreak of Changolism and chucked a case of big'uns into the ice box.  

Look out for the halal piggies!

Following on from the discovery of vegetarian squid, SH3 now brings you a halal piggery deep within the Islamic Jama'at of Sai Kao close to which we shall be running this coming weekend.
Details are:
Songkhla Hash House Harriers' run #1707, Saturday March 8th 2014, 4:30 p.m.
Hares: Yardstick and Kii Leum with short assistance from R2D2
Misdirections: From The Kao Saeng intersection take the old Yala Road for 16k and turn right for 3.5k then left just after the big tree and follow hash signs for about 1.1k, then take the gravel road right, just before the piggery for about 900m to the runsite. If you are coming from Hatyai, turn right at the Nam Noi traffic lights and go 12k then turn right just before the big tree for 1.1k... etc.

No immediate information about the HH3 run on Sunday, but some future dates for your diary:

March 22nd: SH3 and HFMH3 runs in Sadao courtesy of Buk Toy, with a camp-out and  the HH3 run probably from the same location the following day;
April 12/13th: Songkran weekend with a visit from KL Full Moon H3: normal SH3 run on Saturday, town run on Sunday morning;
April 18th-20th: Hill walk at Khao Lon in Phattalung;
June 21st: Koh Samui H3 600th run: We've been invited...

HH3#??? - Numbers can't describe it.

But we can still try. Long run (red and green): 6, 360's, 8, F's; 6.7k, max. height: 119m, total ascent, 191m. First runners in, in just about 1 hour. Short run (green only) about 4k. No serious complaints were voiced so it must have been ok.

Bend it like Beaver

There were threats of massive shortcutting by the rabble, so the hare decided to make a run so weird and eccentric that people would be too confused to go off paper. What you see here was the result. It's the kind of track that would have been just about impossible in the days before GPS.

Apart from Yardstick blundering into the in-trail fairly early on, it all worked pretty well. Sex Sprinter seemed to be particularly befuddled, getting most of the checks wrong and returning to the site from a strange direction well after the pack. Egghead appeared quite delighted at "coming in ahead of both Stick Insect and Sex Sprinter", not that we keep track or anything. Both Stick Insect and Khii Leum were swearing like Dutch sailors (no offense, Leaking Seaman) as they screwed up one check after another, which can only be a good thing.

Long run measured a hair over 7km without the checks or exactly 8km if you ran them all. Total ascent was a moderate 270m with a high point (the check where the short run diverged) of 160m. The short run was the better part of 5km with almost the same total ascent. I was a bit concerned that it might be a little too much for them, but our short runners have become a hardy crowd. Give them just 4km now without a hill and they complain it's too easy.

Quiz notes

Another Nail in my Heart? Black Coffee in Bed? OK, then how about Pulling Mussels from a Shell? Squeeze, of course, one of the greatest half dozen or so bands ever to come out of Britain. Here is Another Nail in my Heart, featuring Glenn Tillbrook on vocal and a guitar solo as good as anything Clapton & co. ever did.

Step aside Cumberbatch, you young punk. Jeremy Brett (1933-95) was obsessed with becoming the best Sherlock Holmes ever. We fans would say he succeeded.

To accompany the carrot question there was going to be one on squid too, but I decided it was too hard: how many limbs does a squid have?* [Illustration: Stick Insect's dream woman]

*Ten: eight arms and two tentacles. So the woman's got the right number but the wrong way round.