The competition that I will be entering typically occurs on the June 11-12 weekend. That means it is only 39 weeks away and I had better start getting shit done. It occurs to me that my remaining preparation time is roughly the same length as a full-term pregnancy. Instead of actively transforming an embryo into a fetus into a baby, an amazing thing that women do every day, I will be growing myself some big lats and mudflaps, which I think you will agree is an equally important accomplishment. In order to embody Feminist Figure Girl I must forge ahead with a careful plan, drawing on my genetically determined organizational skills; even my kindergarten teacher noted them in an early report card. I clearly missed my calling. Instead of a fitness-crazed professor, I should be one of those people from Clean Sweep who rushes into your house with plastic bins, throwing your useless crap in the garbage while you stand by in a shocked state, crying your eyes out. ‘Do you really need this inflatable raft for three with paddle?’ Toss. ‘And the coyote carcass in your freezer just has to go.’ Although they might seem absurd, both examples are informed by my banal everyday life, just like the rest of this blog. 

THINGS TO DO BEFORE JUNE 2011

-find out who makes those jewel-incrusted velvety swimsuits with padded bras that figure girls must wear. I hope she lives downtown and not in the suburbs, god forbid.

-read Merleau-Ponty on phenomenology, perhaps in the original French, in order to reconsider women’s experiences of fitness and bodybuilding. Steer clear of the imprecise version of ‘phenomenology’ promoted by education departments.  

-learn how to walk in high heels. This must be done in stages: 1) learn how to walk; 2) learn how to walk in medium-height wedges; 3) learn how to walk in four-inch wedges; 4) walk well in high stilleto heels; 5) walk outside in these high heels, or maybe even run in them, while the hot tamale follows me in a car, shouting advice into a bull horn.

-balance the positive aspects of my obsessive tendencies with the negative ones. Balance the positive aspects of my obsessive tendencies with the negative ones. Balance the positive aspects of my obsessive tendencies with the negative ones. 

-produce a prospectus for the FFG book and send it to publishers. Try to be realistic about my chances, forgetting the remark made by an internationally famous professor that I will soon be talking about my project on Ellen.

-build an ass that can knock over Canada post mailboxes as I strut down the street. Then avoid arrest for public mischief.

-get some self-discipline in relation to food. For example, I must not eat the jumbo mixed nuts and biscotti now enclosed in the man-closet, a space that is not mine.

-stop fantasizing about the man-closet.

-learn to respect and take seriously the imaginary limits that I have created in my life.

-repeat such positive self-affirmations as ‘you are a good person with nice hair,’ while dancing to ‘Because I’m Awesome’ by the Dollyrots.

-try to drink less coffee, except if coffee helps with fat loss in which case I should drink much more coffee.

-read Figure Competition Secrets, a book I just purchased and downloaded. Write witty blogs about it, and include photos of ridiculous things that I must nevertheless embrace as important. 

-try not to lose both my mind and my partner as I shed about 20 pounds of fat by hiring a diet coach and obeying her every command. Avoid falling in love with diet coach.

-replace daily practice of baking for relaxation with something more productive. Here I am drawing a blank. Suggestions most welcome. Knitting? Les emissions en francais? Lying on the couch and watching TV with my partner (his suggestion, shouted from the living room, where he is lying on the couch, watching TV. And eating that biscotti. Damn!). 

-go to the nutrition centre on campus and trick them into providing me with an accurate BMI, using all their fancy equipment. Try not to feel intense shame if my fat percentage is over 18, the number given to me by the $60 electricity-pulses-through-my-feet scale purchased at the drugstore that sells everything except drugs.

-try to write more blogs about embodied experience, something the vivacious M has asked me to do.

-go to the Olympia weekend in Las Vegas September 24-25, including the fetish after party, with G-Smash. I have already bought the tickets, so get ready for that blog, one worth holding your breath for. Damn those prepositions!