Cathy had moved down to Sussex after university and had a good job with a local conservation charity. She lived in a shared house with two other twenty something young women, both professionals who were very career focused and earned rather more than she did. They all got on well, despite Cathy thinking that her housemates were a bit shallow and materialistic and them thinking that she was a bit of a tree hugging hippy.
One evening they were having a bit of a girl's night, enjoying a couple of drinks and watching a chick flick. Cathy's face was coated in an organic green face mask that was supposed to be good for her skin, while her housemates were busy painting their toenails and comparing cosmetics. Cathy mentioned a new project at work to make a local nature reserve into a haven for water voles. As ever, funding was a problem, but a grant of several thousand pounds was available if they could match the funds themselves.
'Water voles?'
'The population has declined by 97%. Mink eat them.'
'Are they cute?'
Cathy wondered how it was possible for somebody to be so ignorant of British wildlife, but found some images on her phone.
'How cuddly! I used to have a hamster that looked like that.'
'Why not do do something and get sponsored for it? You could raise quite a bit if you did it right.'
Cathy was never entirely clear as to what marketing actually meant, but thought her housemate who 'did something in marketing' might just be on to something.
'You need something with a high profile that's going to attract the green pound.'
'What about the Naked Bike Ride? They've been doing that every summer for the last few years in Brighton. Aren't they all naturalists?'
Cathy explained the difference between naturists and naturalists, and that the WNBR was about oil dependency and road safety for cyclists. She was a cyclist herself, and didn't even have a driving licence, unlike her housemates who both had cars. She was also well aware of the WNBR, but had never taken part.
'It's not really about conservation', she said, 'And I don't think that people get sponsored to do it.'
'What you need is an angle, something to make it more interesting.'
'You mean like doing it in fancy dress?'
'That wouldn't be naked, would it?'
'So what do people do with their clothes during the ride?'
After a bit of online research, they discovered that people undressed at the starting point, put their clothes in a backpack or saddlebag and got dressed again at the end at the nude beach. A lot of participants would go for a quick skinny dip before they got dressed and made their way home.
'Not everybody goes fully naked...'
'But most do.'
'And it's mainly men.'
'About 60/40, although far more men go fully naked than women.'
'And a lot of them are more interested in each other. This is Brighton, after all.'
'OK, so how about if somebody did it properly naked. Left home without any clothes, did the ride and then went back, all starkers?'
'So they'd be doing the ride as part of a nude-a-thon, right? Instead of being naked just for the ride, they'd be naked for the whole day!'
Cathy wasn't sure about where the conversation was going, but felt she had to inject some reality into the proceedings.
'By "somebody" you mean me, I suppose? How am I going to cycle 12 miles to Brighton on a busy summer Saturday, stark naked, and not get stopped by the police? And even if I manage that, how will I get back?'
'Easy. You don't have to cycle all the way - my brother's got a van. He can take you to the start point and then pick you up from the nude beach. OK, you'll be a bit exposed when he picks you up and drops you off, but with all the other naked bodies around it shouldn't be a problem.'
'Your brother?'
'Yes, the one you met. The one you fancied until you realised he's totally gay. He'll be up for it - he'll think it's a great laugh, and there's a seat in the back of the van so no one will be able to see you once you're inside.'
'Well, I suppose it's possible....'
A couple of days later, her housemates told her that they had run the idea past various people at work and they reckoned that she could get a lot of sponsorship. Cathy told them that she needed to raise Β£5000, and she doubted that she could raise that much even with her friends' help.
'If we can get Β£5000 in sponsorship, will you do it?'
'OK, if you can get that much.'
'Brilliant - you'll be like Lady Godiva for the water hamsters!'
'Voles!'
'Whatever.'
Cathy didn't think they'd be able to raise that much, but she had to consider the possibility. She wasn't prudish about nudity, and had been known to skinny dip while on holiday, but this was a daunting challenge. The WNBR was intimidating enough, but they were talking about her spending the whole day out with no clothes available at all! That evening, she stood naked in front of her mirror and contemplated herself. She wasn't exactly skinny, but according to her last medical checkup her BMI was exactly what it should be. She had long wavy brown hair, glasses and still looked like a student. She didn't bother much with make up and tended to wear loose, baggy clothes. Her housemates thought she was a bit frumpy, but they went to the other extreme with clothes and make up.
Her figure was pretty good underneath her shapeless clothes. Her boobs were a generous a cup or a stingy b cup, depending on how you looked at it, but were perky, firm and didn't vanish when she lay down. Her nipples were pink and prominent enough that they poked through most of her tops. She owned 3 bras, which she only wore if necessary, and about 2 weeks worth of plain cotton knickers, although in summer time she would sometimes wear a long skirt with nothing underneath. Her housemates had lingerie for every occasion, all bright colours and lace trimmings. She shaved her legs and armpits in summer, but left her bush untrimmed. Her ex boyfriends had all found her attractive, but she knew that she wasn't glamorous and hardly the stuff of adolescent male fantasies. Could she see herself cycling naked through the streets of Brighton? Slightly to her surprise, she could.
A few days later there was another surprise.
'You're a trending hashtag on Twitter,and there's been loads of hits on the Facebook page. We're past Β£4,000 already!'
'Twitter! Facebook! What are you on about!'
'Relax, we haven't identified you, just put out the word that a beautiful young conservationist will spend the whole Saturday of the WNBR naked in order to raise funds for a conservation project. There'll be a blog, of course, and we'll need some photos as evidence, but this thing is really taking off!'
'Photos?'
'Of course there'll be photos. Loads of people will get snaps of you on the ride - just search WNBR on any photo sharing site. You just need photos to prove you've done the whole day naked - you can easily take a selfie without showing your bits and bobs.'
'Yeah, you need to keep it discreet and tasteful.'
'And of course we'll help with the blog.'
'Why don't you join me on the ride if you like it that much?'
'It wouldn't go down well at work, but in your position you don't have to worry about that!'
They showed her some examples of naked selfies, and by posing carefully she realised that she could get a suitable image that showed she was naked without compromising her modesty. It then occurred to her that she was taking naked selfies and enjoying it, something that would have been unbelievable a few weeks previously. Then there was work to think about...
'Well, Cathy, it's certainly a bold initiative, and it won't count against you in any way. I think it would be better if you didn't display the name of the charity, though. Some of our corporate sponsors are a bit shy of anything that isn't family friendly.'
'How would I display the name of the charity?'
'Lots of people have slogans painted on their bodies. 'One less car', 'can you see me now?', that kind of thing. I assumed you'd have some kind of conservation slogan painted on you, seeing as that's why you're doing it.'
'Oh, I see. Thanks for being so understanding about it. I'll think of a suitable slogan.'
'I had 'burn fat not oil' painted on my back last time I did it.'
'Did you really...'