SCREEN NAME: WGAcowboy

REAL NAME: Steve Monk

ALIASES: Black Fart (comes from eating too much chili).

D.O.B.: January 5, 1949; Tampa (by the bay), Florida. It was on a Wednesday evening and I believe the tide was in.

SIBLINGS: Three: Kevin, Jenny and Jeffrey

FRIENDS: Many: at work, at play, AOL, everywhere I go. I like making new friends.

SCHOOL: I have found that experience is the best teacher if the tuition ain't too high. High school, some technical school, lot's of hard knocks (Hey! What can a cowboy expect?).

PETS: Cats.... seven or eight of 'em at last count. They just keep crawlin' outta the woodwork 'round here. I love 'em all.

JOB: Whatever it takes to make ends meet.

HOBBIES: Writing, reading, fishing, Western Americana, camping, gunfighter history, Custeriana, boatbuilding, caving, rappelling, hiking.... almost anything to do with the great outdoors. Travel and adventure, talking about the Old West with a friend or colleague. Blowin' holes into tin cans with my single-action revolver.

BEST ADVICE: Live life to the fullest while you can, you don't know what your next life may bring. Learn from your mistakes, prosper from your triumphs.

WORDS OR PHRASES USED TOO OFTEN: Damn! Booted ofline again!

SCARIEST THING I EVER DONE: Rappelling 310 feet into an Alabama mountain in a hole known as Megawell.

FAVORITE THINGS TO DO: Anything involving travel and adventure. Fish, read a good book, write, surf the net for Old West history.... take life at my own pace.

ATTACHMENTS: My boat, my truck, my woman, and my cats... but not necessarily in that order.

CHARACTER TRAITS I LOOK FOR IN A PERSON: Honesty above all.

CHARACTER TRAITS I HATE IN A PERSON: Lying, cheating, cruelty (in any form). Dishonesty... deliberate or by omission.

FAVORITE COLOR: Deep red, as in Western sunsets and the Red Rock Country of Arizona.

FAVORITE FOOD: Anything that goes well with a good bottle of wine. Chili... just about any way that you can fix it (and I know of quite a few).

LEAST FAVORITE FOOD: Anything served at a fast-food franchise. I only eat REAL food. None of them dehydrated beef patties from undernourished South American cattle for me! Waffle House is great, if you don't mind the grease. The waitresses there are real friendly.

FAVORITE SUBJECTS: Western Americana, fishing, Arizona history, outlaws, lawmen, and gunfighters of the Old West.

FAVORITE SPORT: You should know this by now.... FISHING!

FAVORITE PLACES: Arizona, Texas, the West, deserts, the sea.

FAVORITE PASTIME: Writing for and publishing my newsletter on Western Americana.

FAVORITE ACTOR: John Wayne.

FAVORITE ACTRESS: Dolly Parton.

FAVORITE MOVIES: Tombstone (should be awarded best movie of the century!); The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (Clint Eastwood's best flick); John Wayne westerns (all of 'em).

FAVORITE ANIMAL: Fish.... I love to catch 'em and eat 'em.... especiallly catfish.

FAVORITE MUSIC: I like both kinds: Country and Western.

QUOTES: "I've had more regrets in life over the things I didn't do, than I have over the things I did." --S. Monk. "I already have a guilty conscience, I may as well have the money." --Kurt Russell, the movie 'Tombstone.' "Speed is fine, accuracy is final." --Wyatt Earp. "... and God hates stupid people." -- Clint Eastwood, the movie 'The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly.' "Can it be that man can disappear from life and live another time, and does the mystery deepen cause you think that you yourself lived in that other time? Somewhere in my deepest thoughts familiar scenes and memories unfold, these wild and unexplained emotions that I've had so long and never told. Like everytime I fly up through the heavens and see her there below, I get the feeling sometime in another world I lived in El Paso." --Marty Robins, 'El Paso City.'

Cowboy's place has been visited times since March 19, 1998.