Just When You Thought it was Over

I've gone and done it again.
Returning to Orange County, this time to attend the OCHHH on Saturday with a special virgin, my brother!
I digress... my broheim and I went down to Irvine to visit our cousin and her boyfriend as well as other various relatives down in the area. Not wanting to waste a road trip with potential to hash, I looked up the local hashes and found that Orange County was hashing that Saturday, relatively close to where my cousin lives.
My brother has been following this blog (more or less?) since I started it and seems to have become interested in hashing. So I invited him along.
We woke up for the early 10:00 a.m. trail, threw our crap on and headed to the start. It was all smooth as silk except that my brother forgot to pack his running shoes.
Never mind that, we'll stop by Sports Authority and pick some up...
Scratch that, he'll grab some sandals and just wear his Adidas Sambas. Silly bro.
We get there and it's a grand turn-out. I figure about 40ish hashers are there, including some new boots.
After a half-hour late start, they RA starts pulling things together and we do introductions and for lack of a Hash-it, they grab an extra flag and award it to me, myself and I. Silly OCHHH.
We are informed that there will be 3 (count 'em) beer checks. Two unmanned and a third one, also unmanned (those crafty hares!). We take off, almost immediately after exiting the parking lot, jumping down into a drainage channel that leads us under the local Ikea store (I suppose going through their parking lot wouldn't be the brightest idea now, would it?). But first, a beer check.
Those of us willing to hop the fence and get into the muck were rewarded with a 24 pack of cold Pabst Blue Ribbon. Congrats bro, your first beer check!
We continued on... As I entered the tunnel leading under Ikea I hear a "oh shit." behind me.
Turning around, I see my brother poised like a graceful drunk ballerina on one foot, his hand stretching out before him to pull his shoe out of the much. Tie your laces bro.
As my brother slips his shoe back on, I hear the phrase yet again. I turn around in the direction we are heading to see the sillouette of another hasher whose shoe fell victim to the sludge. Tie your laces random OC hasher.
We continue on through the tunnel, at times stepping carefully, at times running in the complete dark with wantan regard to what might be ahead of us, sloshing through the muck, splashing through the water. Keeping close to those with flashlights as if they were lifevests on the Titanic. It was a romp and extremely fun for those who dared enter the dark.
Our reward on the other side was beer-check number two. Yet another case of PBR.
Yes, I pity those walkers who were too primm to enter the dark lair of Ikea's underbelly!
At the next road we jump out of the ditch and return to shiggiless road. Cross a parking lot and traverse in, out and around a couple business complexes before arriving at a Jeep with beer-check number (saaaaaaaay it!) THREE!
I arrive and pop open another PBR while waiting for my brother to arrive. When he does we take off on trail again after a quick respite. This time it leads us around a fence, down some railroad tracks and again stretches across the endless blacktop of business complex parking lots. Sensing the hares and FRB's ahead, I bid my brother adieu and took off, flag in tow. Arriving fairly close behind the FRB's to the On-In (which was also the start in this A-to-A trail).
Quietly ditching the hash-it under a nearby car, I formulated a half-assed (more likely quarter-assed) story of my taking a piss and someone nabbing the hash-it from me while weenie was in hand. They kinda-sorta-not really bought it, and I was given down-downs for both the various expected infractions and then for my superfluous invasion of their circle. But c'mon, they were repeating songs! Even I know this is against standard OCHHH circle code!
My brother was called in for his down-down, they closed circle with Hash Hymn number 1 and then we all shifted over to Hooters for the on-after. Hotwings and beer were served. I was punched in the shoulder by a girl who seemed to have violence issues and good times were had by all.
Oh, I also kinda-sorta stole a beer vessel that Momy Hatchet was returning to the OCHHH from North Carolina after they said they didn't want it.
I probably would have cared less, but the thing looked to have solid history behind it and the only other option was Momy running over it with a car.
So, I guess the LVHHH has some tasks ahead of them and the OCHHH has some retrieving to do. This should be a fun year.