A week earlier I had signed the required contract of 70 prerequisites, promising that I had never been "involved in any act of moral turpitude" and that my "good moral character" was intact. I knew I was in trouble when the only stipulation I could fully guarantee was clause No. 6: "I have always been a female."

My pen wavered as it approached the X at the end. With the public notary peering over my shoulder, I signed on the dotted line and prayed my skeletons would stay in the closet. The pro bono pageant attorney, who went over the 12-page document line by line during orientation, had failed to define bad moral character, but I was betting I'd already ruined my chances.

The Miss America Organization is wary of Miss New Yorks. Historically, they've been bad P.R. First there was Vanessa Williams and her Penthouse spread. Then we had Helen Goldsby's announcement on "Geraldo" that the Miss New York officials were control freaks, and that whether she'd had an affair with a married man was her own business.

Having competed on and off for six years, I felt sympathetic to these fallen Miss New Yorks. I knew how utterly boring it is to pretend to be so damn good. In the past, I'd admire a lovely, mature-looking contestant who claimed to be a virgin, a teetotaler or a straight-ticket Republican. Now I'm inclined to believe she's disingenuous, a hypocrite or as dull as crumb cake.

My experience with beauty pageants began with Miss Vietnam-Oklahoma in Oklahoma City. I was 17. A relative was running the pageant and needed Vietnamese contestants. I entered and placed second runner-up. (My American accent was too prominent, the judges told me afterward.) I resolved then and there to win a Miss America preliminary.

At 18, I became Miss Tulsa 1994 and went on to compete in the Miss Oklahoma Pageant. There, older contestants assured me that only the veteran contestants stood a chance at winning a state title. If I hung around a few more years, I might actually be able to take the coveted trip to Atlantic City, N.J.

Nonetheless, I began to observe what most pageant officials already quietly knew -- that despite claims that the Miss America Organization exists solely to promote the education and scholarship of young women, a disquieting trend persists: Many contestants opt for a substandard academic curriculum to have more time to prepare for pageants. I saw dozens of contestants leave school for a year, transfer to remedial community colleges from state universities or drop out of higher education altogether when the pageant bug got too hungry.

Brilliant Careers: Sound and Vision Audio and video highlights of our Brilliant Careers profiles