2010-05-10 57 11

Participants

Expedition

A week ago, me and Gabriel discovered that we would be celebrating our first hashiversary today. Last Friday, when today's hash point was released, we discovered with great happiness that the hashiversary point would actually be reachable! (At least four fifths of the hash point in this graticule falls into the sea, and are therefore unreachable, provided you don't own a boat, which we don't, in case you wanted to know. (I think that was some kind of personal best regarding the use of dependent clauses. (And now also a personal best in the great art of using nested paranthesises!))) As a matter of fact, the hash point was not only reachable but did as well fall into a region of the graticule we hadn't visited since our very première hash. This was simply an oppurtunity that couldn't be wasted!

Since my (Jonatan's) bike is in a condition not very well suited for trips longer than some 10 kilometers (Gabriel claim it's dead since at least two years - I claim it's not! Maybe dying, but definitely not dead!) we decided that me borrowing Gabriel's city bike would slightly contribute to the probability of succeding with the expedition (this means I simply refused to use my own...). It has to be said that Gabriel's city bike is not in the best condition either, but it was still a very unfamiliar feeling for me to be riding a bike with working brakes - a bike you could actually stop without putting your feet down to the ground! (Exotic, isn't it?)

As usual, we started the expedition at Gabriel's place and did all the preparation necessary. After spending far more time than necessary on preparations (definitely partly my fault) we left for the hashpedition! Apart from the hash point being somewhat close to our very first hash point ever, the weather was also quite similar, implying non-neglectable upwind all the way to the hash point. The wind was luckily not very heavy though, only tiresome. Halfway, we had to use a ferry, to cross the Nordre älv (a river). At this point, we were very lucky and arrived just on time for a departure. We even entered the ferry as the very last vehicles.

When we finally got close to the hash point, we had to practise a little bit of hill climbing in order to reach the very spot. Nothing exhausting or problematic but only just enough climbing to get a wonderful view from the hash point. At the hash point we sat down, and had a well deserved picnic, just as on the hash a year ago. Gabriel had even made some very tasty Chokladbolls to accentuate the hashiversary celebration. Before we left, Sigrid gave us the hash-biology-lession-of-the-day (see below), after which we felt enlightened and inspired enough to start the journey home.

The journey home was far easier than the previous trip, since the wind was now blowing in the right direction. Apart from being as lucky with the ferry as on our way to the point (again, we were the very last vehicles to board) there is not very much to say about this trip. It was sunny, and the wind helped us quite a lot. A typical life-could-be-far-worse-trip. Simply.

After getting home to Gabriel, we all went inside as I wanted to rest my legs. After some discussions of logistic, biological and philosophical art, I left for the last seven kilometers to my apartment.

As I got home, I got a beautiful sunset as a gift from mother nature - a very suitable and thoughtful end of a great hashiversal day.

The Biology Lecture of the Hash

Today, I learned the following:

1. You may eat the rhizome of common polypody. Apart from being edible, it is also quite tasty. However, common polypody usually don't get very large, so if you would like to, for instance, make a polypody pie, you would have to pick quite a lot of these...

2. If you ever have seen Sheep's Sorrel shifting in red and green, and asked yourself the obvious question: why is it like this? Then the answer might (or might not, see 3.) be one of the following:
- The sorrel is partly red, since it has to protect itself from to much sun. If it absorbs more sun energy than it may use up, the remainder of the energy is hurting the poor herb. This is not good, hence it tries to reflect some more of the red light (which it obviously gets to much) by shifting in red.
- The sorrel might get to little sun, and by changing the pigment, it tries to absorb more of the light it lacks.
- The sorrel might want to say: "Hey, look at me, I'm so poisonous that I can use bright colors and still avoid getting eaten!"
- The sorrel might want to say: "Hey, look at me, doesn't those nice colors make me look tasty? Come and have a try!" I didn't quite get the reason for such a message, however...

3. Biology isn't an exact knowledge, or it is, or it is very complex, or it is, eh, whatever.