This is the fourth in a series in which we shadow prominent Northern Californians as they go through their daily routines..

She's the daughter of former San Francisco 49er great and Senior PGA golf champ John Brodie and the two-time winner of last summer's NBC reality dating hit, "For Love or Money."

In the first episode, Los Altos native Erin Brodie and 14 others vied for a bachelor's affection. She won his heart, but when the producers made a last- minute offer -- the bachelor or $ 1 million -- she took the money and ran.

In "For Love or Money 2," Brodie picked Chad Viggiano from a field of 15. At the last minute, he was also offered $1 million. But in another twist, if he went for love, not money, Brodie would walk away with $2 million.

Chad picked love and a year later, they're still a couple. Though he hasn't become her tele-hubby yet, they've done the talk show circuit and she was in People magazine last month.

Brodie and Viggiano focus more on work than play, shuttling between San Francisco and Los Angeles so that she can pursue a TV career while he (and his brother) manage the family's food-processing business.

Photo: Deanne Fitzmaurice Photo: Deanne Fitzmaurice Photo: Deanne Fitzmaurice Photo: Deanne Fitzmaurice Photo: Deanne Fitzmaurice

On a recent visit home, Brodie talked about the show, their relationship and how her life has changed now that she's a woman of (even more) means.

10:30 a.m. Sports Club/LA, the gym at the Four Seasons Hotel with floor-to-ceiling windows that look down onto Market Street. Lou Rawls' "You'll Never Find Another Love Like Mine" is playing over the speaker system; Brodie, 31, is oblivious to the irony, listening to the Rolling Stones on her iPod. Her two-hour workout consists of a 3 1/2-mile jog on the treadmill every day, free weights, lunges and abdominal work, which may help explain why, at 5 feet 9, she weighs 128 pounds and wears a size 4 or 6.

As she lifts weights, I ask how she got onto "For Love or Money" in the first place. "Oh, jeez," she says. It was two years ago. She'd been working for five years as a sales manager at Advent Software and was at lunch with a friend, who suggested she try out for reality show auditions occurring next door.

"I was like, 'Whatever,' " Brodie recalls. "It was Friday, I was hung over and I'd never seen more than one episode of 'The Bachelorette.' "

She went anyway. They liked what they saw and asked if she'd come back the next day. She made the cut and was asked to be on the show.

Contestants were sequestered in separate hotel rooms until everyone arrived in Los Angeles, then blindfolded, put into limousines and driven to the mansion where the show would take place.

First, they were told it was a dating show; later, they were informed there'd be a million-dollar twist. They were allowed to suntan by the poolside and read "cheesy magazines," she says, but barred from contacting the outside world, using cell phones or watching TV. And there were cameras in every bedroom. "As soon as you wake up, they're filming every conversation you have, except in the bathroom," she says. "You wear a microphone, and someone in the TV control room, where there are banks of monitors, is typing everything you said."

Contestants were interviewed for hours each day. Questions were asked and rephrased so that the producers would get the answers they wanted. If a camera or lighting person talked to a contestant, he was fired. "Only the scriptwriters can talk to you," she says. "Some shows are not as strict. This one is, because of the money twist."

She wants to host a TV show, whether it's entertainment, sports or fashion. Why host? "I can't act, really," she says. "I'm better on my feet, thinking quickly, than with something scripted."

Also on the horizon, she hopes, is a publishing deal for her to write a book about dating. She's also scheduled to be a judge in the America's Junior Miss pageant later this month in Mobile, Ala.

Viggiano has flown up from Los Angeles and is golfing, but Erin promises we'll meet him after lunch.

11:30 a.m. Showers, then blow-dries and straightens her hair with a flat iron. On the show she was a brunette, but no more, and not by choice. "No matter what color you ask for in L.A.," she says, "you turn out blond."

On her face: a self-tanning gel by Darphin of Paris, followed by beige Chanel SPF 15 sheer sunblock and Tarte cream blush in "Sun Kissed" on her cheeks. The lids get eyeshadow (smoky in the crease, pale on lids and brow), and the lips get bubblegum pink lip gloss. "I'm still stuck in high school," she says. "I can't help it."

Once she puts on jeans, a white halter top, an off-white leather jacket and cowboy boots, she looks anything but high school. She has turned from "girl next door" into a stunner. I feel the envy rise and fall away. She's so bubbly and unaffected, she's impossible to hate.

12:30 p.m. Lunch at Paragon restaurant on Second Street at Townsend (Caesar salad, anchovy left on the side of the plate) with an old colleague at Advent, Diana Dorobek, the friend who pushed her into the reality show, whom she hasn't seen for a year.

Brodie was an excellent employee with "really good organizational skills" who was "very efficient" and had "good ability to coordinate different departments," she says.

On the first show, Brodie's strategy was to play it aloof, while the other top contender wore her heart on her sleeve. Brodie said she "couldn't see" dating the bachelor; he wasn't her type. She took the money.

The second show was filmed in the same house. Brodie didn't especially like having to trade massages with the guys on the show (during dates) or lie about not having been to the house before. "I wasn't supposed to know about the money," she said.

Once the episodes had been filmed, but before they'd finished airing, the media started calling Brodie's old office, trying to follow her around to see if she was spending lavishly (a possible indication that she'd taken the money) and detect whom she was hanging out with (to see whom she had picked instead).

Dorobek wants to know if Brodie has been hanging out with any celebrities. "I have no Hollywood friends!" she protests. "What Hollywood stars have you met?" Dorobek asks. "Bill Murray," Brodie replies. "And Ashton Kutcher, I saw him. He's not as cute as Chad."

1:30 p.m. Brodie and Dorobek walk a block over to Advent to surprise Brodie's old chums. She says she's embarrassed by media attention, hasn't warned anyone we're coming and asks us not to take photos of the reunion. We reluctantly agree. "Hollywood's here!" a co-worker says. "I miss your energy!" says another. "Hey, bro!" say two other guys, who challenge her to a putting contest, but renege when they can't find any golf balls.

Everyone seems smitten. Brodie's beautiful, but she's also "one of those girls who'd have coffee spilled on her shirt, or her thong sticking out of her waistband," Dorobek says. "It makes her approachable."

3 p.m. Offices of Smith Barney, Menlo Park. We're in the heart of Sand Hill Road, the world's largest venture-capital corridor, for a reason. Brodie is determined not to end up like all those lottery winners who strike it big, overspend and end up bankrupt. She's enlisted a financial adviser, Carter Crum, to help her invest a good chunk of her winnings, and is here for their quarterly meeting. She's asked Viggiano, 30, to come along. He may have his own money to invest; Brodie did use his shoulder to sign a $500,000 check over to him in the show's finale, as a reward for taking the risk of choosing her over the money and because she felt they "earned the second million together."

Brodie declines to disclose the details of their finances but lets us sit in on the meeting. (For the record, a disclaimer appeared briefly at the end of "For Love or Money 2" saying that the $2 million would be paid out in the form of an annuity over 40 years; if taken in a payout, it's been reported that the lump sum would probably be less than half the $2 million prize.)

Crum talks about the economy, explaining what "order backlogs," "inventory numbers" and the reported growth in manufacturing jobs have to do with the rise and fall of the various stocks she's bought. They talk about commercial and residential real estate investment strategy. He sends her home with a folder of stock picks that they'll discuss later, when safely out of the earshot of a reporter.

I ask Crum about the stories I've read in which lottery winners end up (inexplicably) broke. They apparently think they have more than they do, and overspend, and forget about the tax bite.

"Taxes are real," Crum says. "It never pays to cheat the IRS."

5 p.m. We're back at Viggiano's loft on Harrison Street at Fifth; he moved in three years ago and it's done in Pottery Barn- meets-modern. It's their home base when they're in San Francisco. It's cocktail hour; we snack on smoked salmon, brie and Spanish sheep's milk cheese. Viggiano sips Cabernet while Brodie cracks open some bubbly, an acquired taste.

"I never even drank champagne before I was on the show," she says.

Viggiano found his way to the show through a talent scout who was at the same bar (at the Viceroy Hotel in Santa Monica) at the same time.

"He said, 'I watched you walking around the bar, saw you talking to girls, and liked how you moved,' " Viggiano recalls. Viggiano didn't care about reality shows, was in a rocky five-year relationship and tried to blow him off, but the scout called his phone number for three months until Viggiano came around.

He finally went on the interview at the encouragement of his parents; 90 minutes later he was told he'd made the cut.

He arrived to find he'd spend a lot of time drinking beer and barbecuing. The pressure started to build when the "dating" began because no matter where they went, there were camera people everywhere, even hiding in trees, he says. Viggiano was the first one to kiss Brodie, a fact that didn't faze him until his reality-show buddy, Vic, put it this way: "You kissed her on national TV."

He was falling in love but still had doubts as the finale neared.

"I was not sure if she was playing a game, and wondered, 'Why am I playing for a million dollars? I don't want to be played, out-duped, on national television,' " he recalled.

In the end, his values won out. "I knew I would choose her. Money's never really been important for me. Yeah, I like to do nice things, but money -- what does it really do for you?"

Viggiano tells me his parents have been married for more than 30 years. They came, he says, "from nothing," in New York and moved away from their families, then built a business and a life together. "My parents are great people," he says. "Erin's the same way -- solid, down to earth, stands behind me."

Viggiano's folks live in Blackhawk; hers in La Quinta, near Palm Springs. Her 68-year-old dad, who is recovering from a debilitating stroke in 2000, got a brown velour Adidas tracksuit as a gift from Viggiano and allegedly has not taken it off since. The real sign of family acceptance? "My mom now takes Chad's side when I call to complain," Brodie says.

Viggiano's previous relationship was "turbulent, a roller coaster," he says. "With Erin, there's no fighting beyond five minutes. We both have the same 'let's move on' attitude," he says. "The day's too short for petty things."

Still, neither of them is ready for marriage yet. "We're not in any hurry, " she says. "We got offered a lot of money to get married on TV." Viggiano says they turned it down because "it cheapened it. That's just not the way I see myself getting married."

"That's why Chad's still with me -- because I'm not ready to get married," Brodie teases, smiling.

Viggiano, who seems head over heels for her, instantly objects.

"C'mon -- that's not right," Viggiano shoots back at her assessment. He sees me scribbling in my note pad. "You should not print that!" he implores.

6:45 p.m. They're off to Cozmo's, in the Marina, for cocktails with his friends; then she'll go to Izzy's Steak & Chop House for dinner with her girlfriends. Over a drink, she gets contemplative. The life of a winner is not quite what it may seem, she says. "This is the first year since I graduated from college at USC that I don't have a job. I feel like a loser. Sometimes I get one-day or two-day jobs, like a pre-Emmy show I did for 'E!' or 'Good Day Live.' "

She says she has a lot more time to think about what her life could be. "When you're in the corporate rat race, you don't take enough time out of your day to sit and reflect on what your priorities are," she says. "There are endless opportunities out there; you just have to focus in the right place."

One thing is certain. Come September, when, she predicts, her spending money will be gone, "I'm gonna have to find a job. I need income."