Friday, August 30, 2013

This Just In: Some Whales Tan Too

It seems that some whales are capable of "tanning" while other whales avoid doing so according to this BBC Television Story on Tanning Whales .  Scientists believe this can help provide clues to the process of human aging.

One thing's for sure:  ALL whales go skinny-dipping ALL the time.  Swim naked much and you never really grow old.

Thursday, August 29, 2013

Take Our Labor Day Weekend Challenge!

Labor Day Weekend is almost here.

It's that time when summer ends, many nudist clubs in the North start to close (or at least wind down activities) and much of the naked world puts on its clothes.  But it's also a GREAT three days off from work for many of us and a GREAT time to catch some last-minute rays in our birthday suits.  To that aim, we'd like to invite you to take the Bare Platypus Labor Day Weekend Challenge:

Wherever you are, whatever your schedule, see if you can spend at least twelve (12) continuous hours naked.  Uh huh.  Naked. Nude. Totally in your birthday suit.  Bare bum.  Twelve hours without putting any clothes on.

On one hand, this may be very simple to do if you're spending the weekend at a nudist club or never   leaving home. It's also easier if you consider that you can sleep nakey for probably eight of those hours ( See Sleep in the Buff Bare Platypus article here)  (and Read Why Sleeping Naked is Normal in this Platypus Post ).  But you'll have to time other aspects.  Read your morning paper online (you probably already do) so that you don't have to walk naked to the curb to get it---or flunk the challenge with a bathrobe.  Warn your mom you'll be sipping coffee starkers in the kitchen.

The back yard barbeque could get tricky too.  But please don't hurt yourself trying to meet a fun challenge either.  That's the point.  Have fun. Play naked as much as you can.

Happy Labor Day.

Tuesday, August 27, 2013

Stop Calling Your Pen*s "Junk"

Have you happened to notice how many places---from message boards, to jokes, and comment sections---folks are using the word "junk" to describe human genitals?

Read a post about a nude beach like Sandy Hook New Jersey and someone gripes, "I don't want to go to the beach and see some old guy's 'junk'"  A different post in a different forum lamented that "without dividers between urinals in the men's room, my junk's on display."

Since when did our bodies, or its special parts, become "junk"? We recognize that occasionally a euphemism or two is necessary to avoid triggering spam filters.  That's the reason for using the asterisk in today's blog post title, by the way.  We're certainly not ashamed of the word "penis."  We just know the word may not get by the bots that screen the blogs you follow.

The psalmist wrote, "I am fearfully and wonderfully made."  We agree.  And the Great Creator didn't make any "junk." 

Unless we're referring somehow to a large, floating, Chinese vessel, does "junk" carry a connotation of anything positive?  Didn't think so.  If some folks say something too many times, however, they may start to believe it. Start thinking there should be a law to ban "junk" anywhere.

It's time to move on with a different attitude.

Monday, August 26, 2013

Wearing Clothes to the Clothes-Optional Beach?

There's an interesting article and poll on the NJ.com website asking are you creepy if you wear clothes to clothing-optional Sandy Hook?   Located on the Gateway National Seashore, Sandy Hook is one of the great beaches in America to take it off, sun your bum, and get that wonderful all-over tan.

A member of our Bare Platypus team only went to Sandy Hook once and, he must confess, he went completely naked for as long as he could that day... All day. (He worked a table gathering signatures on a petition in support of another nude beach in the state.)

Sandy Hook on a beautiful day is too beautiful not to do nude in his opinion.  Although strong winds blowing off the water make it helpful to have a wind / sand screen to avoid being "sand blasted" when those winds pick up.

Go clothed on Sandy Hook?  Couldn't imagine doing it. But we'll let you judge for yourself.

Here's the original article on NJ.com about Sandy Hook: Story About Nude on Sandy Hook .

Sunday, August 25, 2013

Heidi Klum Gets in Buff, Talks Buff

The Bare Platypus does not post photos on its site so you will have to click this link to view the Heidi Klum Birthday Suit Photo . It is a very tasteful depiction that was photographed a couple of years ago.

No doubt Ms. Klum is a model. But what is especially appealing about her to the Platypus team is how genuine and matter-of-fact she is about the human body,  In other links that may be accessed from the story, she discloses that another image recently posted of her topless on Instagram was taken by none other than... her own mother.  She has also discussed  being topless on the beach.  She's a confident mother of four.

We seem to remember her once defending the tasteful nude images of herself and her husband that were posted in some parts of their home.

Who a person is on the inside is important.  This woman seems to have heart when so few celebrities do.

Saturday, August 24, 2013

Top 10 World Naked Hotels Story Runs in China

Stories about the "Top 10" naked hotels or destinations are nothing new, of course.  Several appear every summer it seems.  We think it's interesting that one rarely sees the exact same entries among the top 10's, demonstrating that "best" is often a matter of opinion and where one lives.

What makes the following link a bit more interesting, however, is who carried the story.  Top 10 Naked Hotels as Reported in China tells Asian travelers (in an online periodical that is provided in English too) about the best places to lodge bare.  When the Asian market fully discovers the joys of nudism, nudism will become a lot MORE significant.

This is not the first story about nude travel to reach China, of course.  TIME magazine for Asia did a piece many years ago about it.  But that story was mainly about what people in the US and elsewhere themselves did.  The linked story has much more of a, "if you plan to visit one, here's where the best are" feel to it.  (We recognize that the source of the information itself was from a German travel company, but, hey the writers had to get information from some source, right?  And who better to evaluate nude information from the FKK practicing Germans?)

We have read about a very few clothing free destinations in China but there weren't many discussed publicly when we last researched the matter.  Perhaps that's going to change.

By the way, Orient Beach made this list.  It is one destination that often appears, notwithstanding what we wrote in paragraph 1.

Friday, August 23, 2013

Women Happiest with Naked Selves at Age 34

There's a story all over the news the past couple of days.  In it, representatives for a spa business .based in the United Kingdom surveyed over 1200 women and found that they were most pleased with what they saw, naked, in the mirror when they were about 34 years old.  Read one story reporting 34 years preferred for seeing selves naked by clicking the link.

It seems that before that age, as in adolescence, women have too many insecurities.  And that after that time the aging process gives ladies pause.  (About 40 percent of respondents said they looked at their naked bodies in the mirror about every day.  16 percent reported that they had never looked at their naked selves in a mirror.)

At the Platypus we believe that every person is a beautiful person and should see themselves that way.  Male or female, 6 to 60.  If more people gave nudity a try, maybe they would change their view.

Thursday, August 22, 2013

A Comic "Strip" in Today's Funny Pages

Today's edition of the Hi and Lois comic strip has one of the characters playing outside in a loin cloth that he loses to a "wardrobe malfunction."  This is one of few bares in the comics these days.  There used to be more skinny dipping and such sketched during summer months.  Ah well.

Here's the Link to Bare Hi and Lois .  It will expire in about 30 days though.

11/03/13 Update:  The link has expired. However,  you can see the entire crew in the buff in a single panel, wherein the cartoonist drew them into a trophy designfive decades ago. Click http://hiandlois.com/author/brian/page/16/ and scroll to the middle of the page with the words "award season". Would we ever see anything like it today?

Sunday, August 18, 2013

Dear US Forest Service: Please Try More Naked Time and Places

While driving today the Bare Platypus heard one of those radio messages "from the AD council," which seem to be more prevalent on weekends when stations have sold less paid advertising.

This radio spot began with various members of a family making lots of talk about technology, computer, and social networking.  There was the daughter raving about how many likes she was getting on her postings, the mother interrupting her children to read repeated texts, phone messaging beeping in, cable TV, etc. etc.

Then silence.  Then birds chirping as an announcer said "Get unplugged this weekend." "Connect with your family in the outdoors of a US forest to hear streams and see bluebirds and find yourself as a family again..."  This isn't verbatim.  Just the essence of the ad.

The Platypus crew can relate.  We love the great outdoors.  We think the Forest Service makes a good point.

But the Platypus also got to thinking, "What if my wife and I went to most such forests and found some secluded trails and wanted to experience nature as closely as possible by being in our natural, nude state?  No loud radios or technology.  No littering.  No disturbing the flora and fauna.  Just walking naked. Most of the US Forest Service wouldn't like us taking them up on their "back to nature offer" that way!

In fairness to the Service there are a FEW designated clothing-optional places on Service lands.  Mostly out west like at Cougar Hot Springs in Oregon.  Or parts of Service land around Lake Tahoe.  There are more places where folks go bare among the bears, of course, yet it's usually while looking over their shoulders hoping that Ranger Smith won't have a problem if they catch you dressed in nothing but what Yogi and Boo Boo wore.

So, after many years, and many communications from many nudists, its still very rare that one can truly enjoy forest and open sky in one's birthday suit among the agency's millions of acres.  We're not sure that anyone in the agency was ever really listening. 

Still, they'd like us to listen to their advertisements.  Go offline and get unplugged.  Get back to nature and get closer to it.  Just not too far back or too close. 

If you see a bare bum it better be on the internet...

Friday, August 9, 2013

More News About Nakedness

Today there are a of stories making the rounds.  First, in Spain there's word of a man who used his own improvised camera installed in sunglasses to film ladies bathing on the nudist beach.  The eyepiece is being compared to Google Glass in this Nudes Story . ( The Bare Platypus has considered the impact of Google Glass on our naked way of life in prior posts.  See Is nudism ready for Google Glass?      See also Google Glass Revisited )

Squaw Mountain Ranch is featured in a television news story today.  Click the link to read a bit about the club's history and the folks who visit now.

Tuesday, August 6, 2013

Cute Subaru Ad Themed on Lil Nudist Passenger

There's a cute Subaru Advertisement out for the company's Forrester SUV.  In the spot titled redressing room created by ad agency Carmichael Lynch, a very patient mom deals with her toddler son's constant affinity for nudity and removing his clothes. A song in the background voices lyrics like, "Oh to be free" and "In our birthday suit..."

The ad closes with mom showing up at a birthday party where the boy was presumably a guest, pulling extra clothes from a case in the trunk, and saying "why, no... he's n-e-v-e-r done that before but I think I have some clothes here" into the phone. 

Love.  It's what makes a Subaru.  And the Platypus household loved this commercial.


P.S. If you like the ad, you'll probably like Volkswagen's Routan Commercial  starring a resourceful little guy.