This year's Pooper Bowl started on Houston's south side at Barnet Stadium. The main topic of discussion among the gathering hashers was the previous week's poison ivy. Dumpster Digger takes the prize for the most ivy seepage. Catamite arrived and presented Hooter Bill with a grocery bag full of porno magazines that his roommate had supposedly left behind. Catamite's roommate obviously had some perverted fetishes. I was most impressed by the novel use of a smoked sausage. The crowd grew to about 80 hashers, and the hares, Peterbuilt and The Marlboro Man, assumed their positions on the back of the shag wagon and issued the following instructions: The trail is laid in flour, unless its laid in tape, in which case On is red, False is blue, a check is red and blue, or is a false red and blue and a Back Check blue. Who the hell knows. I'm pretty sure the hares didn't.

From the start, the trail proceeded through the stadium parking lot to an easement which led to the first flagging of the day next to a pond. We entered a park from the back and came to the first stumping check of the day. The only trail that was found led into a fenced in parking lot. We saw the hares heading south on Wayside and proceeded in that direction, eventually finding another check. There were at least 3 false trails coming off of this check and the hares had laid trail beyond each False, so if you happened to miss the "F" you got screwed. The next twenty minutes were spent running through a neighborhood until we came to a beer check manned by Will-He-Peter. Trail led to what I think was Simms Bayou and another tough check. Roller Balls and No Hands were the first to brave a crossing and apparently they chose a deep spot to do it, as No Hands suddenly disappeared into the murk. They found trail on the other side so I crossed a little further up stream. What we didn't realize was that we were actually running a false trail backwards. I got separated from the pack but eventually hooked up with Pinball and Zoltan. After interrogating some local kids for information, we found trail and made our way up Telephone Road to the On Home at the Jet Motel. Unfortunately we cut off the last part of the trail that went through a seedy apartment complex and featured genuine raw sewage. Sometimes you shortcut and lose.

The Jet came with all the things you'd expect from a seedy (no offense to the proprietors) motel: shoe-less children, broken down cars etc. The hash congregated in the back of the parking lot. The hares encouraged everyone to go back to the start and retrieve their cars (if they ever wanted to see them again). Cars were retrieved, beer was drunk, down downs began. The hares couldn't be found, so to suitable proxies did their down downs for them. A plethora of new boots: Goes Both Ways fulfills her weekly new boot quota by bringing Ed and Pat. Greg was made to come by Call Girl and Ruth was brought by ManHoler. Lisa made herself come. Johnny Crisco made Jamack come. I'm sure there were many worthy accusations but let's cut right to the awarding of the coveted Pooper Bowl. Is it the highest complement that can be paid to a hasher or the ultimate insult? A little bit of both. The previous year's winner, Slammer, skipped town, so the duty of Pooper Bowl awarder went to a former winner, Will-He-Peter, who picked Gonad the Barbarian. Rumors abound as to why Gonad was chosen. The most likely being the blackmail photographs that Gonad took of WHP following his roast earlier this year. Unfortunately, non-disclosure was part of the bargain struck by Gonad. As in years past, the presentation revolved around the humiliation of the recipient. Gonad was adorned with caramel and some kind of pasta dish by a throng of harrietes and Drummer Bill, and then did a down down out of a soiled bedpan. After the Pooper Bowl was awarded, Will-He-Peter brought out his Buffalo Bills tombstone and set it a blaze with a healthy dousing of Coleman fuel. The circle broke up as the noxious fumes of burning styrofoam filled the air.

The On On On was at the Jet Motel clubhouse. I am running out of time so here is the abridged account of what happened: We ate barbecue, watched several police cars survey the motel parking lot with spotlights, drank alot of beer, listened to gangster rap on a set of blown speakers, saw a guy in a Chuck E. Cheese outfit (supposedly the owner), watched Muscle Twat spank Will-He-Peter not once but twice at leg wrestling. Some people were watching the TV.