I have a boar hunt coming up in June (moved from April); a coworker overhead me mention it and this is the following conversation.
Coworker (CW): You’re going to shoot a pig?
Me: Not a pig like on the farm, a wild boar.
CW: We have wild boar in America?
Me: Yeah.
CW: Why do you want to kill it?
Me: I don’t want to kill it, I want to hunt it.
CW: So you’re doing this for the meat?
Me: No.
CW: So you’re just killing it for fun?
Me: No.
CW: I’m confused.
Me: I’m doing it for the challenge. I could go plug some deer with a rifle if I just wanted to kill stuff, but that’s not a challenge, and it’s not about the killing. Taking a boar with a handgun at close range presents a challenge for me as a marksman.
CW: So you’re doing it just to kill an animal?
Me: …….yes. I’m a bloodthirsty maniac, intent on butchering Piglet.
CW: That doesn’t seem right. Doesn’t that pig have just as much a right to live as you?
Me: I guess that’s his tough luck for not evolving higher on the food chain, then.
It occurred to me that I was glad I hadn’t told her that next year I want to use a spear.