It’s likely gone for good, lost when she removed it before plummeting down a 40-foot slope on a BMX bike as part of the Playboy X-Treme Team, she said while driving to her Santa Monica residence.
Worrying about time may become increasingly common for the 26-year-old former Tanana resident and West Valley High School student, whose coming weeks are crowded with interviews, photo shoots and appearances.

Such is the life of a Playboy Playmate–Alaska’s first.

Rae, who said she grew up without running water or electricity in Tanana and briefly lived in Fairbanks as a teen, appears as “Miss November” in the popular men’s magazine.

The issue hit newsstands Friday and should reach as many as 8 million people in the United States and 15 million worldwide, Rae said.

And, yes, that’s a lot of people to see you naked.
But the veteran model said she is a fan of the magazine and described the pictures as “incredibly tasteful.”

Rae’s mother had mixed feelings about the issue.

“It’s a huge measure of success and also a measure of embarrassment,” said the woman, whose name the News agreed to withhold to avoid calls from her daughter’s admirers.

“I do not want to be bothered by people. This could get pretty bizarre,” she said.

Rae, who graduated high school early and attended college out of state, described her upbringing as sheltered.

But by the time she called her parents to tell them about the pictorial, she had already established a high-profile career that included bikini and lingerie photos.

Her parents had already gone through the small-town reaction to a previous, single photo of Rae in Playboy in 2000.

Rae said her parents told her they’d prefer she wasn’t appearing nude, but that they support her.

Playboy publicist Theresa Hennessey said each month’s Playmate, or centerfold, is chosen from a pool of hundreds of women who send in their photos or are discovered in model searches, in clubs or just out in the general public.

Before catching Playboy’s eye, Rae was spotted on an Australian beach by a female photographer shooting a calendar.

Rae’s modeling career took off, and she eventually appeared in Playboy’s “Women Down Under” pictorial in 2000, which led to the centerfold, Hennessey said.

Rae’s been interested in publishing since childhood, she said. She was an editor of her high school newspaper.

She worked for the News-Miner as an editorial assistant as a teen, studied journalism at the University of Oregon and launched a magazine called SWAY (Sydney Will Amaze You) in Australia.

A shot at writing for Playboy–one of her long-term goals–is one reason she posed for the magazine.

“I’m better at being the interviewer than the interviewee,” she said.

Playboy bills its organization as a family, so the opportunity may arise.

“You never know. She’s part of the Playboy family now, so it’s probably a lot easier for her,” Hennessey said.

Rae has already interviewed Playboy founder Hugh Hefner for her own former magazine, which she’s since sold.

Despite what people may think about his seven girlfriends, Hefner was a gentleman, Rae said. “He’s respectful. He treats his ladies like princesses.”

Rae’s mother said her daughter assured her that, no, Hefner doesn’t require the Playmates to sleep with him.

“A lot of us thought that,” Rae’s mother said.

Myths aside, the pictorial is opening doors for Rae professionally. Next month, she’ll appear in a national Budweiser television ad and is shooting a calendar called “Hef’s Angels.”

Each Playmate stays at the Playboy Mansion in California while shooting the pictorial–which, in Rae’s case, was photographed about a year in advance. In addition to being featured in the magazine, Playmates appear on Playboy.com and one of the magazine’s home videos.

The option for more work through the company is usually available, as advertisers and events coordinators often seek the high-profile models for commercials and public events.

“After that, they can do as much or as little as they want. Once a Playmate, always a Playmate,” Hennessey said.