“Emotions can override…the more powerful fundamental motives that drive our lives: hunger, sex, and the will to survive. People will not eat if they think the only food available is disgusting. They may even die, although other people might consider that same food palatable. Emotion triumphs over the hunger drive! A person may never attempt sexual contact because of the interference of fear or disgust, or may never be able to complete a sexual act. Emotion triumphs over the sex drive! And despair can overwhelm even the will to live, motivating a suicide. Emotions triumph over the will to live!”

true story

We went out to explore the wilderness. Ben and I decided to have a break under a nice willow tree by a stream while we left Luke to his ways roaming the undergrowth. A few minutes went by and then a lot of branches cracking and nettles being trampled happened. We looked to our right to see Luke wandering back making his path of destruction behind him. In his hand he had an egg. He had found a pigeons nest.
As he's fidgety in nature, as we talked he kept rolling it around in his hands, shaking it and tossing it about. Eventually the inevitable happened and he cracked it a little. We both went "oh Luke"
After making him feel bad about what he had done he retaliated in anger by whipping out his pen knife and cutting it in half. Lots of yolk came out and a tiny tiny foetus. Eventually we shrugged it off.
A week or so went by and we met up at mine again. We decided for a smoke so we went out into the gale force winds and found a place to smoke... The same stream with the willow tree. Immidiatly Luke crashes forward into the undergrowth, realises where he was, to look for the nest.
He arrives back 5 minutes later triumphantly holding in his hand, a second egg.
We knew we couldn't do anything to stop him, we were already blazed too, so we just stood back, and watched the demon do his work. He shakes it too his ear "it doesn't have much yolk in, I wonder if the foetus has developed"
We knew what was coming. The knife again. "IN THE NAME OF ECOLOGY" proclaims Luke
Before we could protest, the egg is in halves and a horrible disgusting, fully developed foetus, beak and all slithers out.
I feel so guilty

Some people should lose their right to quote.

Fenimore Cooper's literary offenses

There are nineteen rules governing literary art in domain of romantic fiction -- some say twenty-two. In "Deerslayer," Cooper violated eighteen of them. These eighteen require:

1. That a tale shall accomplish something and arrive somewhere. But the "Deerslayer" tale accomplishes nothing and arrives in air. 2. They require that the episodes in a tale shall be necessary parts of the tale, and shall help to develop it. But as the "Deerslayer" tale is not a tale, and accomplishes nothing and arrives nowhere, the episodes have no rightful place in the work, since there was nothing for them to develop.
3. They require that the personages in a tale shall be alive, except in the case of corpses, and that always the reader shall be able to tell the corpses from the others. But this detail has often been overlooked in the "Deerslayer" tale.
4. They require that the personages in a tale, both dead and alive, shall exhibit a sufficient excuse for being there. But this detail also has been overlooked in the "Deerslayer" tale.
5. The require that when the personages of a tale deal in conversation, the talk shall sound like human talk, and be talk such as human beings would be likely to talk in the given circumstances, and have a discoverable meaning, also a discoverable purpose, and a show of relevancy, and remain in the neighborhood of the subject at hand, and be interesting to the reader, and help out the tale, and stop when the people cannot think of anything more to say. But this requirement has been ignored from the beginning of the "Deerslayer" tale to the end of it.
6. They require that when the author describes the character of a personage in the tale, the conduct and conversation of that personage shall justify said description. But this law gets little or no attention in the "Deerslayer" tale, as Natty Bumppo's case will amply prove.
7. They require that when a personage talks like an illustrated, gilt-edged, tree-calf, hand-tooled, seven- dollar Friendship's Offering in the beginning of a paragraph, he shall not talk like a negro minstrel in the end of it. But this rule is flung down and danced upon in the "Deerslayer" tale.
8. They require that crass stupidities shall not be played upon the reader as "the craft of the woodsman, the delicate art of the forest," by either the author or the people in the tale. But this rule is persistently violated in the "Deerslayer" tale.
9. They require that the personages of a tale shall confine themselves to possibilities and let miracles alone; or, if they venture a miracle, the author must so plausibly set it forth as to make it look possible and reasonable. But these rules are not respected in the "Deerslayer" tale.
10. They require that the author shall make the reader feel a deep interest in the personages of his tale and in their fate; and that he shall make the reader love the good people in the tale and hate the bad ones. But the reader of the "Deerslayer" tale dislikes the good people in it, is indifferent to the others, and wishes they would all get drowned together.
11. They require that the characters in a tale shall be so clearly defined that the reader can tell beforehand what each will do in a given emergency. But in the "Deerslayer" tale, this rule is vacated.

In addition to these large rules, there are some little ones. These require that the author shall:

12. Say what he is proposing to say, not merely come near it. 13. Use the right word, not its second cousin.
14. Eschew surplusage.
15. Not omit necessary details.
16. Avoid slovenliness of form.
17. Use good grammar.
18. Employ a simple and straightforward style.

Even these seven are coldly and persistently violated in the "Deerslayer" tale.

Someone told me a story!

So, this is my story of visiting Sandhill. It's an old abandoned village on the outskirts of Taunton. It's supposedly haunted but no one really knows.
A few of my friends and I decided to visit it one Friday night mainly because we were bored. We went by car with 5 of us crammed in. There's a turning off the main road to get to the village, it's pretty decrepit and overgrown by thistles, nettles, and brambles but our car just pushed on through the pathway riddled with potholes. 10 minutes went by and we still hadn't arrived. An opening in the path revealed a small area big enough to park, but there was already a car there, quite old, but it looked like it was still in use. A rusted red, Nissan Micra. We decided not to park there and continue up the path. The air was hazed with mist, even on full beam we could only see a few metres in front of us. But with determination, we finally arrived. An even bigger opening revealed a large run down farmhouse. Windows shattered, cobblestone crumbled in piles on the floor, wooden framework rotted, bent.
We decided to explore this house first. It was large, two stories high and surrounded by barbed wire. A complex method had to be done to cross the wire without cutting ourselves. So one of my friends held it down while the rest of us eased over it precariously. When we were all over, we looked around in the fog to discover the back garden of the house. It was divided by a small weathered wall. There was an overgrown garden teaming with bracken, a collapsed chicken pen reduced to wooden planks, and in the corner was a shed, a large open top one. The door opened with a loud creek but what was behind it was worth it. An old 1967 mustang, obviously beyond repair with rust as it's ill doer, but still pretty cool.
Anyhow, we went back and found the back door entrance of the house. There were large boulders piled up to block off the way in, but there was a small gap you could clamber through at the top.
I was about halfway up when my friend whispered "guys, I think there's someone in that field opposite us"
I had a good vantage point. The fog had cleared and sure enough I could see what I thought to be two silhouettes standing far away watching us, by the hedge.
We continued to stare. More scared by the idea of our assumption coming true and the figures moving. But after about 5 minutes of an intense staring competition, we dismissed them as trees.
But it was moments later that panic was reimbursed into the group. A child's laugh, and the sound of footsteps from around the other side of the house.
One of my boldest friends quickly darted round the corner, only to come back wide eyed saying "there was nothing there"
We all agreed this was making us feel too uneasy and we decided to head back.
Out of nowhere, screaming and heavy footsteps appeared. I turned around to see that those two figures weren't trees. Two fully grown me , blackened by the dark, giving out blood curdling screams and darting towards us.
Panic struck the group. Every man for himself. The barbed wire now seemed like no obsticle. I hurdled over it with menacing speed. Not high enough. My ankle caught a barb and I sprawled across the fence. No time to check the damage. I stood up, but applying pressure made me limp. It was only a short distance to the car. Everyone had made it but me. I dared not look around for fear there were close. Anticlimatically, I made it back to the car and we all caught our breath. Looking back across the field onto the house, the people, and screaming had disappeared.
On a unanimous decision we got the fuck out of there. Passing the potholes, the brambles, the nettles, the car park, but not the car....
However, this the least of our worries. We just wanted to get the fuck out.
Catching our breath we turned onto the main road. Each of us joking about how scared the others were. We were settled again, but not for long. Appearing out of the black behind us, a rusted red, Nissan Micra.
"Shitt, is t that the car that was parked up earlier?"
10 minutes of us taking unusual turning, it was still following us. The driver decided to risk it and pull over in a lay by. It pulled over too.
Before we knew it, three men sprung out of the car and lept upon us, banging the windows and bonnet of our car. Needless to say we locked the doors and wound up our windows.
They finally stopped and looked at us. We still couldn't get a clear view of there faces, it was misty again. And their efforts of clothing made it obvious they didn't want to be reckonised.
In a gruff voice one suddenly spoke "Ahh, we're just kidding lads. We like to scare people who come wandering up Sandhill. We're paid by the government to keep people away. As a sorry why don't you lads join us for a smoke?"
Taking this opportunity we slammed the accelerater and sped off. There was no way we were believing that bullshit. We looked back, they weren't following us. Big relieves and sighs, it was over.