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Many people use nicknames that they have picked for no particular reason. I, on the other paw, have a very particular reason for calling myself (and my homepage directory) Won-Tolla. The explanation begins with a quote from Kipling's Jungle Book:

They heard tired feet on the rocks, and a gaunt wolf, streaked with red on his flanks, his right fore-paw useless, and his jaws white with foam, flung himself into the circle and lay gasping at Mowgli's feet.

"Good hunting! Under whose Headship?" said Phao gravely.

"Good hunting! Won-tolla am I," was the answer. He meant that he was a solitary wolf, fending for himself, his mate and his cubs in some lonely lair, as do many wolves in the south. Won-tolla means an Outlier - one who lies out from any Pack. Then he panted, and they could see his heart-beats shake him backward and forward.

"What moves?" said Phao, for that is the question all the Jungle asks after the pheeal cries.

Well, if you want to know what was moving in the Jungle that day and how my namesake got into such a state [or, for that matter, what a pheeal is], I recommend a trip to the library where you can no doubt find a copy of The Second Jungle Book, which is where the rest of the story (Red Dog) can be found. But if all you want to know is why this miserable wolf is my namesake, it's very simple really. One day a couple of years back I got in touch with an amigite who called (and for all I know is still calling) himself "Lone Wolf" because he did not belong to any group. I found that I was in the same situation, but I couldn't exactly steal the name, so I started looking for something similar. Then I remembered Won-tolla, a name which freely translated can mean "lone wolf". And then I guess you can figure out the rest...


Oh, by the way - there is another guy on the net who uses the same name (only with a small t like the original; you may have noticed that I spell the name with a big T just to be a little different (one bit to be precise...)). He does not have a page here, though. Why don't you send him a note and tell him what he's missing?