I couldn't stand to read the whole thread. I got through about 7-8 pages in and almost decided to quit hunting myself.
You have had an overwhelming amount of good advice here, and I can only offer a couple points.
First, about this 'buck fever' excitement thing. So what you're excited? If you're not excited, you're clearly wasting your time. Might as well quit hunting and go back to hookers and blow or whatever DOES excite you. When I stop getting excited, I'm done.
Dealing with the excitement takes a little self discipline, but there are things that can help you function through the excitement. As a fairly successful whitetail hunter (150+ mostly bow, but also pistol, rifle, shotgun and muzzleloader) and a hunter education instructor, range officer and independent firearms instructor, I've helped people get through this. I've taken whitetails with all sorts of implements and have a fair idea on how to hunt them in our areas.
Know that the excitement of a chance at a game animal occupies most of your consciousness and in that time, we tend to forget our basics. Anything you have to consciously think about to do WILL get f**ked up under pressure. They call it 'buck fever', but it's actually a simple failure to correctly execute the basics correctly while you're distracted and excited.
Return to the basics and drill them in until they are automatic. There is NO substitute for this, it must be done to achieve competency under pressure.
Using your bow for example, shoot until correct stance and posture are automatically achieved EVERY time you draw. Drill this in from various positions. Standing in a fixed position and going through a quiver full of arrows is NOT effective hunting practice. Stand facing left, face right, face away, sit...whatever it takes to break position. Then get up/turn, face the target and draw and shoot as quickly as you can make a solid shot, being careful to assume the correct position every time. Practice a few arrows per session, a couple short sessions a day, until it becomes 'old hat'. Do it, do it, and do it some more. Whenever you draw your bow, you will automatically come to your correct anchor point and be able to make a competent shot.
The ability to set yourself up unconsciously/automatically frees your mind to think about things like ranging, potential obstructions, getting the shot opportunity...; real-time problems requiring real-time solutions. Don't waste your conscious thought on stuff you could drill in and do automatically. No different than hunting upland birds - a grouse flushes, you automatically place your feet to assume a proper NPOA, swing with the bird and fire...all inside a couple seconds or less. Your bow handling needs the same response.
Then, you MUST hunt where the deer are. It sounds obvious, but I hunted many days without seeing deer because I was hunting marginal sign created by occasional deer passing through. One fact that I learned that totally changed my approach is that deer crap about every 4 hours. If you're not hunting over deer crap, you are clearly not hunting where the deer ARE.
Find bedding areas, find feeding areas, find travel lanes that intersect (indicating more traffic). These will be the areas where the deer ARE. Place yourself between feeding and bedding areas in the morning, between bedding and feeding areas in the evenings. Learn that sign found in fields and open woods is most often left at night. Sign found in/near thickets and other cover is where you want to be to hunt daylight hours. Deer often stage themselves well back from feeding areas, especially open areas, until just before dark. This means it often helps to move more in the direction you expect them to come from.
Being where the deer are helps immensely with trying to sit quietly on a stand. If you KNOW a deer will eventually pass by, it is a lot easier to sit still and pay attention than if you feel like you're not likely to see anything. The way to overcome this is scouting and understanding deer behavior.
As mentioned upstream on this thread, wind is hugely important and deer will completely vacate a desirable area if the wind is wrong. I have stand locations that are great on a west wind but suck on an east wind. You have to learn the difference. Deer tend to travel in/through places where they can watch the more open areas and smell the areas they cannot see. This habit has them walking along the downwind side of thickets, the downwind side of ridges, coming out of the woods on the upwind edge of a field and bedding on the downwind wide of a hill or cover with the valley/open areas visible below/out front and the wind carrying the scent of danger from behind/uphill.
When an opportunity presents itself, you must be prepared to react. Putting your rifle or bow down can and will cost you deer. If your cold hand(s) is an issue, use a chemical handwarmer. They're cheap and work great. Hold it in your shooting hand with you rifle or bow VERY close by. I seldom hang or lean a rifle or bow and prefer to lay it across my lap or at least have it in front of me.
Good luck!!
