John Gourley Quotes

I grew up in Texas in a family that fished and hunted, so I've shot guns as a kid.

The original purpose of the beards was to help with the wind when it's blowing in your face. When you're out there in the woods hunting like we are all the time, we found that facial hair helps you to stay a lot warmer.

Lots of times, people go to the mountains and feel like it's not cool to wear a beanie and goggles and neck gaiter. But you're so much more comfortable, and you're getting the protection you need.

I grew up in Southern California. If it's snowing on a day I'm supposed to train, I'll just stare out the window in all my gear and be like, 'Hmmm, maybe not today.' I hate being cold.

While we're filming 'Bake Off,' I can get really cold, so I'm often holding a hot-water bottle or layered up under an anorak and a warm hat.

It doesn't matter what the weather is like - even if it's minus 10 I will go out there and fish.

It's amazing being a member of perhaps the last analog generation - being born in the late '40s, growing up in the '50s and '60s, when it was still a very analog world. And in New Orleans those days, the country was just next door, as it were. You didn't have to travel miles and miles to get out in the woods. There's tons of fishing, obviously, in New Orleans, and tons of hunting. That was part of the cycle of life, to get fresh meat from the butcher or go duck hunting and get it yourself. It wasn't malicious or insensitive. It was just there, and you used it.

November is the most disagreeable month in the whole year," said Margaret, standing at the window one dull afternoon, looking out at the frostbitten garden. "That's the reason I was born in it," observed Jo pensively, quite unconscious of the blot on her nose.

Through the sharp air a flaky torrent flies, Mocks the slow sight, and hides the gloomy skies; The fleecy clouds their chilly bosoms bare, And shed their substance on the floating air.

You might be a redneck if going to the bathroom involves shoes and a flashlight.

In America, if a Democrat even thinks you're calling him liberal he grabs an orange vest and a rifle and heads into the woods to kill something.

Nick sat beside Simon, who was at his computer. Marcus stood at attention beside the food. Hale had his feet on the table, reading the morning paper. And someone had given the Bagshaws a gun. 'Pull!' Hamish yelled, and Angus pulled a cord and sent a skeet flying across the deep blue water. A split second later, a loud crack was reverberating across the deck. Kat jumped. Hale sighed. The shot went far wide, and Marcus never moved a muscle.

Garden work clears the mind.

Traffic counting was very boring and cold to sit out on the streets of New Haven in five pairs of pants - well, that's an exaggeration; it was three pairs of pants - in November for hours and hours clicking buttons counting which cars go left, right, and forward.

There are many different ways now to experience nature. Get out there and hike.

One could do worse than be a swinger of birches.

Every afternoon, I was in the pasture with cattle or fishing and shooting my BB gun. That kind of freedom allows imagination to develop.

I like being outdoors a lot, and I come from a small village that's fairly remote.

When a friend calls to me from the road And slows his horse to a meaning walk, I don't stand still and look around On all the hills I haven't hoed, And shout from where I am, What is it? No, not as there is a time to talk. I thrust my hoe in the mellow ground, Blade-end up and five feet tall, And plod: I go up to the stone wall For a friendly visit.

Winter near the shore is cold. The wind kicks up a salty mist and elephant seals come to shore to trumpet and rut and birth their pups. Retired people put sweaters on their lap dogs and drag them down the street on retractable leashes in a nightly parade of doggy humiliation. Surfers don their wetsuits against the chill of storm waves and white sharks adjust their diets to include shrink-wrapped dude-snacks on fiberglass crackers.

Fish stimulates the brain, but fishing stimulates the imagination.

Today on the way home, it snows. Big, soft caressing flakes fall onto our skin like cold moths; the air fills with feathers.

We have produced some good walkers and saunterers, and some noted climbers; but as a staple recreation, as a daily practice, the mass of the people dislike and despise walking.

They were playing old Bob Dylan, more than perfect for narrow Village streets close to Christmas and the snow whirling down in big feathery flakes, the kind of winter where you want to be walking down a city street with your arm around a girl like on the old record cover.