Live Nude Girls

Teri Polo is nude in Playboy this month.

I don't say this because I've actually seen the pictures or because I'm a Teri Polo fan. But I find it interesting for a few reasons. First, I've finally kicked my addiction to "The Wire" but have moved on to watching Aaron Sorkin's pre-"West Wing" television show,"Sports Night" and Teri Polo was a recurring character on the show. I never watched "Sports Night" regularly when it was on, but would catch it in hotels when I travelled for work. It was a well written show with great dialouge between smart characters. Hence, it was doomed from the start.

Teri Polo is probably best known as Ben Stiller's fiancee in "Meet the Parents" and "Meet the Fockers." Meet the Fockers has made nearly $250,000,000, yet I don't know one person who's seen it. If there were still that many Barbra Streisand fans out there, we'd have a new President.

Anyway, Teri Polo is on the cover of Playboy, where she is described as "one hot Focker," a description that no one who's old enough to legally buy the magazine would find clever.

Second, I'm not sure why she's in the magazine. My friends and I have never mentioned Teri Polo as someone we'd like to see naked. This means she isn't in the exclusive group of roughly every other woman we know.

I'm trying to figure out why she did it. Women who appear in Playboy generally fall in the following categories:

• Women who make a first or early appearance in Playboy and gain fame through it. Jenny McCarthy, Pamela Anderson, Anna Nicole Smith).
  
• Women who wait too late and do it when people no longer care about them. (Farah Fawcett, Denise Richards, Anna Nicole Smith).
  
• Women who are quasi-famous or have gained notoriety through scandal (random Survivor contestants, Jessica Hanh, Anna Nicole Smith).
  
• Women who use Playboy in an ultimately attempt to change their wholesome image (Tiffany, Deborah Gibson, Anna Nicole Smith).

I can't figure out which catergory she fits in. But I will tell you this, even though I've never really thought about it before, I was curious about what she looked like. Men are visual creatures and are intensely curious about what famous women look like naked. Ok, not just famous women, but waitresses, co-workers, newscasters, and maybe 1 or 2 players in the WNBA. I'm not sure why this is, but it must somehow be an evolutionary advantage.

Here are samples of typical conversations with other guys:

Me: "Uma Thurman was really good in Kill Bill."
Other Guy: "Did she get naked?"

Me: "Kate Bosworth is playing Lois Lane in the new Superman movie."
Other Guy: "Is she gonna get naked?"

Me: "Man, did you see Ashlee Simpson get booed off stage at the Orange Bowl?"
Other Guy: "No. I heard she was horrible. Why would she ever decide to embarass herself like that. I'm glad that she was exposed as untalented. Maybe now the music industry will stop forcing these fabricated pop-tarts on us. (pause) Did she get naked?"

Playboy knows that we'll buy their magazine because of our curiousity. (Ok, we'll actually wait until someone posts the pictures on the Internet).

But ultimately, I can answer the question of what Teri Polo looks like nude without even seeing it - exactly like every other woman in Playboy - painfully thin, airbrushed and Photoshopped beyond all recognition, and except for having breast implants, with a build like one of Michael Jackson's play dates.