fuckin moths!
i was sitting in my room a few years back, me and my mates pissed as a gypsies tit! we were sitting laughing are heads of at nothing because we were rather stoned aswel. this strange looking moth/leafy looking thing flew in the window and landed on my head! my mates were like 'wdf is that' it looked like a moth had gizzed on a tree and the tree had gave birth to a moth/leaf, it was one of the weirdest things i have ever seen! i jumped up and started screaming like a wee bitch because things like that really freak the shit out of me. the month-leaf then started flying round the room and banging into things and me, then i decided. get a fucking grip of the situation, everyone is freaking out in my wee small room, I took a dive roll accross the room at the same time grabbed a lighter and a can of lynx, fell on the ground James Bond style, and flame throwed the shit outa the fucker! it took a while for it to die, it lay there twitching for about a half an hour then finally gave up. i felt really guilty for a while cuz of the whole pain and twitching thing! but it was either the moth-leaf of us! i couldn’t help thinking how id never seen anything like it in my life! then wondered, i may have discovered a new species of moth. hrm ah wel at least i can say i wipped out a species
(conzo21, Sat 26 Apr 2008, 11:14, 9 replies)

Crows = Stupid
One day, I heard a very loud bang come from my bedroom, which confused me slightly, what with no-one being in it and all that.

So I went through, and there was a mark on the window.

"Ah," thought I, "some young rapscallion has kicked a ball against my window."

But no. Upon closer inspection, there were patterns on the window. In fact, the distinct pattern of a crow and it's wings fully outspread.

I then looked down, and there was a slightly worse for wear* crow lying on the ground.

Stupid bird.

*Dead
(PenguinOfDeath is Scottish, and most likely angry, Sat 26 Apr 2008, 11:08, Reply)

Tiger
I got clawed by a tiger once. Really. But it was just a tiny 12 week old cub at London zoo, so I am not entirely sure it counts. Bloody hurt though, they might be cute and fluffy but have evil claws even at that stage that go through thick trousers and skin too.

Humerously it then bit my friend and she had to have a tetanus shot in the arse as a result, so all was well ;-)
(Bob the Scutter, Sat 26 Apr 2008, 10:42, Reply)

Does this count?
A blue-tit has been attacking my living room window for the past few days. Just keeps flying straight into it. By the end of the day he looks rather dishevelled, only to re-group over night and start afresh in the morning.
(hutchers, Sat 26 Apr 2008, 10:24, 3 replies)

Those damn roos!
During a trip to a place called Philip Island on the south coast of Victoria, Australia, myself and my friend, Nicole ventured into a nature park to check out some of the creatures indigenous to Australia (Kookaburras, Kangaroos, bats, Echidnas, Wombats, etc).

After wandering around feeding some of the animals, we spotted an open reserve with a few joeys hopping around and thought it would be great to go in and feed some while taking a few snaps close up.

After spending about half an hour wandering round, feeding some of the young 'uns, we found ourselves quite deep into the reserve where the roos seemed to be getting quite large.

Several larger roos (5ft+) decided to venture a bit closer and after hearing some of the stories about how they'll tear you open with one swipe of their claws, we decided to be a bit more wary.

After I'd just finished feeding a joey a handful of feed, I turned around and spotted one of the 5ft roos right behind a crouching Nicole. As I watched, I saw the ninja-roo start leaning back on it's tail, ready to give her a kick. Now I don't know if any of you have actually seen a roo rear back, it's quite a sight to behold. Those tails are pretty damn thick and to see it effortlessly rear back onto it's tail gave me a pretty good idea as to how much power it probably had.

I called out to Nicole and much to her credit, she turned round and offered a handful of feed to her would-be attacker in order to placate him. I joined her and fed it some more. This had the desired effect and after gobbling down a couple of handfuls of feed, the roo decided to retire to a safer distance.

We continued feeding some of the joeys and Nicole had wandered a little further away from me to feed a couple that hadn't had any from us. After a few minutes, Nicole called over to me as I stood up. As I was turning to face her, I felt an almighty whack in my right thigh. Yes, the ninja roo had returned and had got the serious hump that I was feeding some of the young ones. A scene of me taking on the roo in a boxing match and getting my ass well and truly kicked flashed through my mind.

Not wanting to end the day in hospital or worse still, having my entrails spilled over the ground for the rest of the roos to feed on during the night, I backed off, whilst delving into my bag of feed in case it decided to come and have another go.

I tossed the feed in it's direction to distract it while Nicole and I joined forces and made our way through the plethora of roo droppings back to the entrance. Only when I was safely out of harms way did I then shake my fist at it, taunting it till it hopped off into the bush.

Length - its tail was a good 5 ft long!
(Swarve, Sat 26 Apr 2008, 9:43, 1 reply)

Pets and drugs! a shocking expose
My former house mate went on a weekend long bender, coming back from the pub he teamed up with my other housemate for a smoking session. Over the course of a weekend I was getting the fear, over whether the fire brigade would come as there was smoke pouring out his window like a fog machine.

When they came down on the following Tuesday they realized that they had been shopping. housemate 1's g/f had taken them to petsmart while they were still caned off their Cheeto's enlarged tits. They each had a new pet a rabbit and a guinea pig. I don't know what these animals were supposed to be like as I only care for cats as pets. But I'm fairly sure that you are not supposed to smoke 'reefer madness' levels of skunk in the same room as them.

Then the inevitable happened.My house mates ran out of money. No money=no weed. This was bad enough for the stoners, who had to face daytime tv sober. The pets however had spent every day of their young lives high. Imagine if you will two small animals being blissfully happy in their cages thinking dryfood tastes cocking-awesome^TM, to suddenly come down and face reality. Keen pratchet readers would know this as knurd, wiki.lspace.org/wiki/Knurd.


Once docile pets became Vicious, malevolent little bastards overnight. they would snap at you. spit and using their newfound energy, run around all night keeping you awake (on purpose most likely). After about the fourth time the rabbits owner opened its hutch only for the rabbit to leap directly into his face and "have a spazz attack" as he put it, it was given away to some kids.

The guinea pig remained with its owner, ans slowly calmed down. But It could still seek out a spliff from a distance of 20m away.


Never get your pets stoned. they will go a bit odd.
( willenium Fist bump for verification, Sat 26 Apr 2008, 9:36, Reply)

don't worry about the spiders...
a long time ago, when i was very young, there was a 'reptile park' about an hours drive up the coast. this place also had lots lovely native fauna - kangaroos, emus etc.

also when i was very young i was in the brownies (do they still exist? i'm talking the junior girl guides thing, not the delicious fudgy chocolatey cakes nor anything poo related...)

anyway, the brownie pack were taken off on a bus trip to visit the reptile park. the park sold bags of 'food' so that all the little kiddies could get up close and personal to feed the animals. after purchasing a bag i wandered off to find a friendly hungry marsupial or two.

what i got was a crazy beady eyed emu that ran full pelt towards me and snatched the bag from me. i ran off screaming only to be chased by a big male kangaroo that thought i still had some goodies for him. i don't think i have ever run so fast or screamed so much in my life.

i never knew what the 'food' in those bags was but i'm pretty sure it was the 60/70's version of crack - those creatures were prepared to attack a ten year old child to get their fix.
(chameleon61, Sat 26 Apr 2008, 5:49, 3 replies)

Australian animals
Living in Australia, you are liable to be attacked by anything and everything, anywhere. However, this is not about being attacked, but rather avoiding it by the merest fraction:

- I rode over a red-bellied black snake crossing the bush track in front of me on a bike. Since I was going too fast to stop in time I decided to go faster... my brother behind me screamed like a little girl and decided he wasn't going to try the same experiment and let it continue on its way (it takes a fair bit more than a bike to break a snake's back). The red-bellied black is relatively harmless but to this day I am not so sure if it was really that or a brown snake...

- I walked bare-footed and in shorts down through the paddock and stepped right next to a coiled up black snake sunning itself. He obviously had better things to do than attack and I kept walking, this time however with a very stiff gait reminiscent of a robot.

- This time I was sunning myself on the patio and according to eye-witness accounts (though I was completely unaware at the time) a tiger snake slithered under my low easy-chair, popped out the other side, and continued merrily on his way...

- I woke up one night feeling very uncomfortable about what felt like a big hairy spider walking over my face. By the time I decided to investigate and turned on the bed lamp it was gone.

- Walking into the chook shed one fine sunny morning a snake popped down off the roof in front of me and went out. I was very careful about checking the roof before blithely walking in next time, I assure you...

- I've also been stung by jellyfish and bitten by inch-men (one-inch long super-nasty bull-ants with chrome bodies)

- Running along the beach at low tide among the rock pools I narrowly missed stepping on a magnificently huge spiny sea star. I am unsure that if my foot were punctured in thousands of places I would also be poisoned...
www.faunanet.gov.au/wos/factfile.cfm?Fact_ID=119

Considering that all these stories concern snakes, let me alert you to all the other nasties and stories I've heard:

- A friend of ours was chased by a wild boar
- Farmers have found sheep gored and dead in their lower paddocks, assumed to be done by a panther
- Kangaroos if cornered will rear up on their legs and disembowel you - someone apparently at a picnic up north went up to one which laid his guts on the ground...
(satellite blows, Sat 26 Apr 2008, 5:33, Reply)

Decapod crustaceans
Went down to the beach with a girlfriend once for a romantic evening. Sunset, low tide etc. Pure bliss, or so you'd think. Ended up with a nasty attack of crabs. 5% Permethrin sorted them, but fuck me that caused some discomfort.
( enoughblueskyforsailorstrousers, Sat 26 Apr 2008, 5:31, 1 reply)

Yellow jacket stings...
I was doing yard work for a friend of my mom's, and he paid me a pretty decent amount, $50 (US guy here) for about 5 maybe 6 hours of work. Good deal...except for the fact that the brush mower that I was using was hard to handle. That and I ran through a jacket nest in the ground. If you've never been stung, it hurts, for about two or three days just a dull pain in the area. I had about 6 or 7 sting me, and even make it into my clothes. Granted I never liked them in the first place, I hate them now.
(travishayes89 is tired of people starting fights at school., Sat 26 Apr 2008, 5:13, Reply)

rabbits are clever, vicious bastards.
A lot of them have actually stopped getting into people's gardens and started to hack into people's
websites instead.
(apeloverage committed the vile act of onanism on, Sat 26 Apr 2008, 3:41, 1 reply)

a goose mugged my mate Heather for her bread
she was walking back from SPAR via the pond, and it kneecapped her with its beak. horrific stuff.
( Reid got it going on like Donkey Kong, Sat 26 Apr 2008, 3:40, 1 reply)

that cold wet nose...
i was once dating a girl who had a little yorkie terrier. now i'm not too sold on the ol' barkin rats anyway, but this was particularly crabby and vile- it used to yip like it was on meth whenever i came in, growl when i kissed her, try to bite me, trip me up. now her parents HATEWD me- the dog however was their pride and joy. they hated me, and in return, i made it my duty to fuck their teenage daughter in every room of their house.
so we're in her TINY box room (so small the door opens OUT- remember this), trying to fuck quietly (ah, the risk of being caught... mmmmmm) folks are downstairs watching corrie, or some other horrible shit. anyhow, i'm there on the bed at some peculiar angle, going like the clappers when suddenly something very cold and wet touches RIGHT on my bunghole! naturally, i jumped viloently, and flailed an arm behind me, grabbing the dog which presumably was under the bed... lost my balance, fell back, my free hand hit the doorhandle, the door flew open, i fell out with the now-hysterical barking rat still gripped in my hand & yelping like a mad thing, just as her dad steps out of the toilet at the end of the hall to see a naked and tumescent peteloaf rolling round on his hall carpet like an upturned woodlouse, clutching the beloved family pet with his naked daughter lying on the bed in stitches.
needless to say i was barred from the house for a while.
(UppityDamnPrimate LET'S OPEN THIS F*CKING PIT UP, Sat 26 Apr 2008, 2:11, 1 reply)

well, they KIND of got it right.
used to live on a small market garden. heard some commotion one night outside, thought nothign of it, it was coming from the goatshed.

a little later a rather irate neighbour was beating down the door.. turned out he'd been woken by the sound of two men running up the road shouting, being chased by a VERY irate billygoat who was now munching on his beloved flowerbeds and refused to be dislodged.
turns out the cunts had jimmied the lock of the shed, hoping perhaps to steal the lawnmower, only to be faced with the twitchy, perpetually randy, stinkin horned demon known fondly as 'petroc' (in public) and 'FUCKER' in private.
well, they were right in one respect- he was our lawnmower.
bunch of cunts.
the funniest bit was that he managed to open our jury-rigged door again after we'd gone back to bed, and BASH A HOLE in the admittedly rather cheap shed the female goats were kept in, presumably after he tired of rogering them senseless, he took them to visit the nice new restauraunt up the road... hence us being woken AGAIN by the same neighbour, again apoplectic with rage and seein his once-proud flowerbeds filled with forlorn stumps. and rotund goats.
:D
he was a prize-winning cock anyway.
(UppityDamnPrimate LET'S OPEN THIS F*CKING PIT UP, Sat 26 Apr 2008, 1:58, Reply)

Our cat chased a mouse out of the long grass.
The mouse ran up my leg (I was wearing flares).
Unfortunately a large number of my family where also standing around to witness this event.
The story is now part of family folklore.
I cant remember what happened to the mouse but I can remember a song and dance about catching the cat so that it couldn't get the mouse that I was trying to fish out of my flares.
( johnvile dsfadsfgafgf, Sat 26 Apr 2008, 0:26, 1 reply)

Gregory the Goose, Hackney City Farm.
23 years old and randy as hell.

He's blind in one eye, and the sight in his other one must be going, too - a couple weeks ago he tried to vigorously shag my leg after wrapping his neck around it a couple times.

He attacked my bicycle helmet, too.

Also, every time I visit that place, the ducks decide to engage in a bit of gang-rape. Don't believe me? Go down there yourself - those little ones with no feathers on their angry-looking bright pink necks are the females.

This is in honour of Paczki the budgie who died yesterday. RIP, little guy - you were ace.
( KersaI Missive Free Michael Shields! with Monday's Liverpool Echo, Fri 25 Apr 2008, 23:58, 2 replies)

!!!!!
What appropriate timing. As of right now, I am shaking, for fear of walking home. I usually relish the 5:00 hour, especially on a friday. Not today. Noooooo.

Yesterday, as I approached my usual corner during my car-less commute, "the home stretch" of my journey, a black bird (mockingbird, I think) emerged from a nearby bush and began to attack!!!! Him and his mate pulled my hair and dove at my face and pecked at my head with their beaks! I was screaming and running but they continued their assault. This was on a busy street. There were plenty of passers-by. But did anyone help me? Noooooo. It's based in psychology -- the more people that are around, the less likely it is that one of them will aid you. It's called "deference of responsibility" and it's fucking annoying.

Now I know there are a lot of people on this board, but hopefully someone will help me anyway. I have a little less than two hours before I began my daily walk, my death march, and what should I do??? I don't want to hurt the birdies. They are probably only protecting a nest. But I am going to look terrible with my eyes pecked out of my skull. And the sound of birds, once a pleasant and tranquil experience, has set my teeth on edge lately. I'm terrified! *Sobs*

Click I like this and I'll set up a camera at the intersection in question to capture these birds attacking someone else.
(BrainSurgerysFun, Fri 25 Apr 2008, 23:16, 1 reply)

Spiders
I lived with two odd people from a British colony in my 3rd year at uni.

They were putting empty suitcases and boxes up in the attic of the house one day. I'd lent them my off roading bike lights as they didn't have any torches to see what they were doing.

Later they came down and the girl had a swollen lump on her hand. It looked like a scratch and she'd had a reaction to something up there (e.g. loft insulation).

She went to the doctors about it and the doctor told her she'd been bitten by a venomous spider. This was in urban Leicestershire which nature gives a wide berth.
( thistle, Fri 25 Apr 2008, 23:00, Reply)

my housemate used to have
a knitted toy she called "Fluffy the Cat-Dog", because it was a bit crap and you couldn't tell what it was meant to be.

"woof! meow!" she'd say.
(apeloverage committed the vile act of onanism on, Fri 25 Apr 2008, 22:45, 2 replies)

Evil biting monsters....
My brother has a habit of collecting random pets, he's had two rats, he currently has an incontinent cat that shits everywhere...and I mean everywhere...
however he used to collect dwarf hamsters, and introduced me to them one was called jaffa because it had eaten a packet of jaffa cakes,
jaffa was the quiet hamster, well behaved and very cuddly, it climbed into my shirt pocket, and decided it was going to nest there.....
it started chewing its way through my shirt, and was in danger of piercing my nipple as well, until my bro had a brilliant idea to get the hamster to escape..
I would lay flat on my back on the sitting room floor and he would prod it til it shot out of my pocket, which it did, leaving a small trail of hamster shit all over my shirt.

The other one was called Bitey, and he held it out for me to stroke, and as i went in to gently stroke its little furry back it sunk its sharp pointy little hamster teeth into my finger,
now when ever anything attaches itself to your finger you have an automatic reaction to shake it off your hand, which I did, and then bitey the hamster flew across the room.
Luckily it had a soft landing on the bed and didnt go out of the open window and onto the tram tracks in Sheffield.

I am now looking after my bro's latest hamster for long complicated reasons, and already its tried to eat the upholstery in my car, bitten my finger when I went to feed it, and has been driving me mad so far with its spinning in the wheel, because thats all it does, goes round and round and round all afternoon....

I'm sure there'll be more random hamster stories (and not in that way either.......)
(Lord Monkey of Yorkshire,OBE killed a gipsy on...., Fri 25 Apr 2008, 22:18, Reply)

Cow Tipping
Back in '96 I was part of a youth exchange group connected to my local youth club. We had been over to Italy the year before (where my phobia of waxworks had reared it's head, leading to another QOTW tale) with French and Italian groups and it was their turn to visit the land of haggis and sporting mediocrity.
We stayed in a little hut in the middle of nowhere and had entertained our continental guests with orienteering, canoeing and other pastimes bored minds can concoct when they have fuck all else to do.
Noticing that this hut looked out onto a large field full of cows (with all due apologies to those with a predilection for goats, nothing for you here), myself and a few others from the tartan contingent decided to introduce some of our more adventurous guests to the joys of midnight cow tipping, or "cowping" as we called it.
Making sure our coast was clear, and all youth leaders were asleep, our merry band snuck out into the field. Our only light was the moon and the odd torch.
Upon spying a likely target, silhouetted in a bovine fashion by the imperious moon, I decided to demonstrate how this particular operation should be carried out. From 30 yards I launched myself at the beast with the intention of knocking it over as it slept. I barelled into it with all the force an 8.5 stone 16 year-old could muster and landed flat on my arse, the impact accompanied by a distinctly masculine sounding bellow.
Sure enough, I had ill-advisedly lunged at a bull.
Cue numerous respresentatives of young EU solidarity tanking across a field pursued by an enraged (and possibly engorged) bull.
Thankfully no-one was injured, although I did manage a pretty fair approximation of the Fosbury Flop, which I had never attempted before or since, over the barbed-wire fence around the field.

Length? Possibly around 8 acres. Dunno, drunk in charge of a keyboard this evening.
( Boss Keloid Got your mother's maiden name tattooed on my arm, Fri 25 Apr 2008, 21:45, Reply)

This time, it's teamwork
I *swear* this is true!

I may have mentioned our two cats - Friendly and Chainsaw.

Anyhow, one house we had, there was an old people's home next door. The woman who ran it had an Alsatian. One day, it dug its way under the fence into our garden. I'm somewhat scared of dogs, so I was very under-impressed. The cats came to my rescue!

Friendly cat did a very creditable impression of a poorly cat that was near death and easy to chase down... The Alsatian gave chase. I legged it for the house, and went up to my room to watch.

Friendly led the Alsatian a couple of laps around the garden. As I watched, Chainsaw leaped out of a tree and landed on the Alsatian's neck. Friendly spun round and piled in too. That dog took one seriously major pasting at their paws!

I lost sight of it as it tried to dig its way back through the fence.

It ran away a few days later, and was never seen again.

She bought another dog. The cats had that one sorted out in a couple of weeks too. It used to hide whenever the cats showed up.
(purplegod counting down for Christmas!, Fri 25 Apr 2008, 21:22, 2 replies)

Did I mention Chainsaw Cat?
My mother used to have a close friend. Her husband was one of the most unpleasant people I have ever met. He was generally reckoned to be a kiddy-fiddler, as well as being utterly disgusting in person.

Did I mention he was also very stupid? Most people know not to come between a cat and its dinner. Not this perve. He grabbed the cat and picked her up. The vigorous growling didn't put him off. Then my Dad put the cat bowls down, rather more loudly than usual.

Mr. Perve stuck his tongue out at the growling cat. The next few seconds are something of a blur. I do know that the cat hit the floor a few seconds later, and trotted over to her food.

I also know that Mr. Perve didn't notice the four shallow scratches on his cheek, because of the three deep scratches across his tongue!

His wife dropped him at the hospital on her way home...
(purplegod counting down for Christmas!, Fri 25 Apr 2008, 21:14, Reply)

One from old photo collection.
Here is when two loving house cats got my younger brothers spiderman outfit muddled up with a real spider. They attacked, and they conquered!


(Miggyman, Fri 25 Apr 2008, 21:13, Reply)

My brother's cat
We had two cats. The dumb but friendly one, and the... other one. The one that was something like a furry chainsaw.

Anyway, my Dad loved teasing the cats. One day, he finished roughing up the cat as some guests arrived. My Dad turned round, and started talking to a friend. Just as they were debating the finer points of something or other, my Dad suddenly leaped two feet in the air, screaming and clutching his ankle! The sharp of eye would have noticed a rapidly departing cat.

It turns out that the cat had been hiding under a chair, and had waited until my Dad had forgotten about her. Then she'd carefully lifted his trouser leg with one paw, and slashed him across the ankle with the other one. She managed four separate scratches that drew blood, and got away clean.

We were rather impressed...
(purplegod counting down for Christmas!, Fri 25 Apr 2008, 21:07, Reply)

Teenage Bestiality
'Bones' was the school hard man. From the 1st year until this incident in the 3rd he ruled the school with a rod of iron.

He claimed in the summer of 87 that his new dog (a bull mastiff as I recall) could 'do tricks' and insisted that a select few of us retire to his domicile to observe said tricks.

Picture the scene, we all line up in Bones' bedroom whilst he removes his trousers and pulls a straining erection from his underpants, purple bell end glistening pre-cum in the half light.

He takes a knife, and uses it to liberally coat his engorged member in marmite. I remember thinking that was what Darth Vader's cock might've looked like.

Then he calls the bull mastiff over, and encourages it to lick the yeast based spread from his tool.

It obliged, hungrily lapping at his swollen phallus, as he moaned excitedly.

It was at this point things went wrong. As we watched our horror at this adult show turned to even more horror and the obviously hungry mutt couldnt contain itself and took a bite at his todger.

He reared up in pain, blood spurting from his punctured veiny-bangstick. We all beat a hasty retreat to the soundtrack of his screams.
(Vic Flange, Fri 25 Apr 2008, 19:50, 3 replies)

Spider bit my bum
Back in '99, husband #1 and I went to see Brian Setzer (of Stray Cats) in concert at an ampitheater in LA.
They have a great bar, it's all open and is surrounded by woods.
I was looking particularly fine that night, as I was super skinny and was wearing hot pink pants trousers (sorry, turning Merkin) with no underwear and a belly revealing tube top.
As I leaned forward to say something to #1, I felt a stinging pain on my bum. "Ouch" squealed I. The pain was getting steadily worse and turning into a burning sensation, so I leg it to the bathroom to find out what's going on.
I took off my trousers and shook them out and a HUGE tree spider scuttled out of the bottom of the trouser leg.
This led to me yelling quite loudly in the stall "fucking hell, I just got bit on my arse by a spider" much to the horror/amusement of my fellow wee-ers.
The bite mark was visible for weeks and a brutal shade of purple.
( Batshitmentalist is sane for once, Fri 25 Apr 2008, 17:59, 1 reply)

the swarm of DEATH.
well, not really.

about 10 years ago, my friends and i decided that, as it was rather a lovely day, it would be a good idea to head to the beach with a picnic.
we packed into the car, joanne driving, me in the passenger seat, alison in the back with joanne's 7-year-old twin sisters, toni and leanne. all was well.
there are 2 beaches locally, so we decided to head to the nearest one. it took us only 5 minutes to get there and there were plenty of parking spaces. on such a wonderfully sunny day, the lack of other cars should have been a warning in itself.
we unshipped the kids and started to get the picnic things out of the boot, when we noticed them.
ladybirds. hundreds of them.
they had been hanging around a bush in a huge cloud but, upon seeing us pull up in our bright yellow car, they had come to investigate. we quickly bundled ourselves back into the car and took off for the second local beach 2 miles away.
we soon arrived and were cheered to see several other cars and many happy beachgoers. within minutes, myself and my bikini-clad comrades were setting our picnic lunch out on a blanket, whilst the children paddled in the surf. there were one or two ladybirds, but we didn't mind that. if they'd come from here, there were bound to be a few stragglers.
what we didn't know was that these were not stragglers but an advanced squadron, sent on ahead to scout for victims.
in what seemed only to be seconds, the sky was black with insects. there were millions of them. the main attack force had arrived.
panic set in instantly, with screaming, ladybird-covered people running everywhere. we ran for the car which, due to its cheery paint job, was now covered in a crispy insect coating. we tried sweeping them off with our arms and discovered that ladybirds bite.
the twins were almost hysterical, ladybirds flying into every orifice they could find. trying to fight them off was almost impossible, they outnumbered us by about 1,000,000-1. we told the girls to jump as high as they could, thus dislodging their colourful hitch-hikers before we threw the car doors open and dived in.
a few of them got in with us, of course, but we were away from the main onslaught and could begin trying to calm the twins. apart from the subdued crying, we were fairly silent on the journey home, each of us stunned and a little disturbed by what had happened. ladybirds are supposed to flit prettily around the garden, not attack you.
it's safe to say that i now have ample supplies of both flypaper and bug spray in my house. i'm not going through that again.

length? minutes, but it felt like hours.
( Smash Monkey lowering the tone of the whole internet, Fri 25 Apr 2008, 17:46, 8 replies)

Foal Play
Another time, I was crossing a field, and passed near a grazing horse. Not normally a problem, and the horse had plenty of time to see me coming. Only thing was, this was a mare with a young foal, and I was passing between them. That was all it took: the mare swung her rump towards me, and kicked both hooves in my direction.

The good news: she missed. The bad news: on their way back down, one hoof was dragged, forcibly, over a sensitive part of my anatomy. Had she decided to take matters further, I would have been fit for the knacker's yard, but she thankfully backed off as the foal went to her side. I was able to groan my way home with no further incident.

I'd been around horses for years, and knew not to get between a mare and her foal, but if you don't see the foal behind the bushes... ow.
( bnt what, me worry?, Fri 25 Apr 2008, 17:17, Reply)