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I know ya'll are gonna think I*m pulling your legs, but I swear on a stack of BTO CDs that I received the following email just a couple of days ago....

Ed,

I just wanted to drop you a quick note and tell you how much I enjoy reading your various writings. I get *Free Wheelin** in my local paper, and after reading some of your columns I went and purchased your first book. I*m also pleased to learn that you have a second one that's just out. Congratulations on your writing successes.

My name is Peggy, and I live in Tampa, Florida. To be more precise, I live in a nudist resort just outside of Tampa called *Eye Full City.* I find the lifestyle to be exhilarating, and I actually find that it stimulates my creativity. My hobby is painting landscapes, and I always do my best work when my mind is free of stress and my body is free of clothing.

I was wondering if the same thing might be true of writing. Have you ever written anything while in the nude? If not, would you consider doing it if you felt it would help your creativity?

Looking forward to your answer,

Peggy Pinkapples

Let me first go on the record and state that I didn't write Peggy back. Didn't even think about it, to be honest. A woman that paints in the nude and asks a stranger if he writes his stuff while naked is not a woman I'd want to know. Frankly, the only flakes I want to become acquainted with are in my favorite cereal, Post Raisin Bran - not naked female ones from Florida. Plus, I'll bet you anything and a dollar that there are mops in my closet more attractive than this woman is. There's no doubt about it in my mind at all - let's face it, if she was a fox, no self respecting husband/boyfriend would let her go prancing around naked all the time.

Even though I won't be getting to know her, let me be sure and answer her two questions. If I don*t, there are guys out there like Jackie Little, Mike Griffin, and Greg Berryhill who might be tempted to get all sorts of rumors started about what my answers might be. Her first question was,

*Have you ever written anything while in the nude?*

The answer to that is an unequivocal NO! I write in an old wood chair, and most of the time it's a cold wood chair. Make that a very cold wood chair. There's a better chance of me writing in a pink tu-tu than there is of me writing naked.

The next, and thankfully last one,

*If not, would you consider it if you felt it would help your creativity?

NO! Being naked, cold, and embarrassed would not help my creativity in the least.

You know, stuff like this makes me wonder what's the world coming to? Why's there all this hoopla about being naked in public places? Last night, they had someone on Entertainment Tonight who's starting a nude airline! I kid you not! You buy a ticket to fly somewhere with them, and as soon as the plane is in the sky and the pilot turns off the *fasten seatbelt* sign, you*re free to drop your drawers! Can you imagine it? People walking up and down the aisles of the plane naked as jaybirds. What if the plane happened to hit some turbulence, and some eighty year old guy with a flabby gut was headed down the aisle? It's too horrible to even think about. Or what if some nudist spills a cup of hot coffee in their lap? The one positive thing about that would be the creative cussing that would slip from the scalded person's lips, but the rest would not be pretty.

Frankly, not everyone is meant to run around naked, and I'll freely admit to being one of those that needs to stay clothed. Being naked needs to be confined to just two activities, and let's face it - we all know what they are, and I'll keep my editors happy by not going into detail about them here. Other than that, we ought to keep our clothes on at all times. May as well keep some level of mystery going about things as the vast majority of us aren't candidates for centerfolds when we*re naked. As Ed Jr. told me one time years ago, it's one thing for people to think you*re a haint, but it's a whole *nother thing to go out of your way to prove it to them...