Top Secret

We met on the steps of Dead Famous Guitarist Chapel, two bloggers getting together for lunch on an April afternoon. Fire Ant is the name she uses on her blog, although I've been known to call her Often Erotic Sometime Blogging Friend, a pseudonym that was changed just a couple months ago to That Naked Blogger.

We were friends for years before blogs had even been invented, so our conversation over lunch delved into all kinds of topics, including some hypothetical discussion about just what can be done with the different pieces of a bicycle. Eventually, we did talk about blogging; I was feeling regretful that I was not at the FourSeas Conference, going on right now in City Stupidly Built Below Sea Level, a gathering that includes a whole bunch of my blogging friends. All the naked photo shots I could be getting! My readers do love the naked photos, and I live to serve my readers.

"You need another man to strip for you," Fire Ant said.

She's right. I haven't had a naked man on my blog since the time Artist Friend's brother posed for me. We talked over male bloggers we knew, discussing the possibilities. And almost immediately, we hit on the solution.

Picky Mick. He's the studly brother of Pilgrim/Heretic, which means that the photo would fit the Naked Brothers theme. Seriously, how many bloggers out there have a tradition of posting naked photos of their friends' brothers? I could be the first. Plus, he's cool. He has a sense of humor and a blog. He's a singer/songwriter, which means he's used to baring his soul in public. Singer/songwriters are like poets. They take their clothes off all the time.

So yeah, we think it'll be easy.

Of course, Male Blogger Who We Think Would Look Good Naked lives halfway across the country, in Middle of the Flyover Zone State. So we started brainstorming ways to fund a visit him.

"We need to both publish books this year," Fire Ant said. "Then we can go on a book tour in State in the Middle of Nowhere. We can start with a reading at his bar." That plan made sense. It seemed to us that the residents of a State So Bland I Can't Even Come Up With a Pseudonym could use a little entertainment.

"Or if that's too much work, maybe we can just plan to write a book. And write a grant for that," I said.

And so we have a plan. It's top secret, so please, no one leak this to Soon to be Naked Blogger. We want him to be surprised when we show up at his bar, get him drunk, and demand he remove his clothing.

We know that secretly, he'll be pleased.