And that includes her family.

"Every single family member I have in Ohio is taking time off from work, and we are going to work this thing - blood, sweat and tears - to win it," said Dicker, who, like many voters in the First District, is a transplant to Philadelphia.

Yesterday, her spirits and campaign boosted by the endorsement of the Philadelphia Daily News, Dicker worked the phones enlisting volunteers.

Her goal, she said, is to mobilize 500 of them Tuesday throughout the district, which extends from Philadelphia International Airport to Port Richmond and Brewerytown and includes South Philadelphia and Center City.

The push followed a weekend of intrigue - not unusual for the district - during which Dicker fired her campaign manager for, she said, urging her to drop out in favor of opponent Larry Farnese after The Inquirer endorsed him.

In an added twist, she also acknowledged conferring with an adviser to front-runner John J. Dougherty to see where she stood in the polls.

The former campaign manager, Karim Olaechea, said that he did not urge her to quit and countered that she fired him when he refused to drop a long-standing strategy focusing on voters in two predominantly African American wards in the district.

Whatever the scenario - and there are many whispered suggestions - Dicker said she knew she would fight on after Dougherty adviser Larry Ceisler shared a poll showing her in second place in the race, with nearly a third of the voters still undecided.

"I got into this race to defeat the Fumo machine, and I am now in this race to defeat the Fumo machine and the Dougherty machine," she said. "No way in hell am I going to drop out."

The "Fumo machine" is a clear reference to Farnese, who has picked up the support of the incumbent's camp since the senator dropped out of the race last month.

Dicker is familiar with South Philadelphia politics, having once run well, but unsuccessfully, for state representative and being a leader of the anti-casino movement.

Fumo's role in authoring the casino legislation prompted Dicker to be the first to challenge the senator in this race, and it was opposition to slots parlors that allied her with Dougherty in the fight against Foxwoods, which is to be built in Dougherty's Pennsport neighborhood.

Matt Ruben, a cofounder along with Dicker and others of Casino-Free Philadelphia, said the group would work with anyone - conservative and liberal alike - who shared its opposition to gambling in the city.

He said Dicker's efforts were considerable.

"She's always been - in my experience - a creative thinker," said Ruben, a former City Council candidate who is staying neutral in the race.

Despite her strong progressive ties, she has been criticized for backing Tom Knox in the 2007 Democratic mayoral primary over Michael Nutter.

Asked at campaign events about backing Knox, who also had Dougherty's support, Dicker said it was his outright opposition to casinos that swayed her.

Listing her occupation as "community activist" on her tax returns, Dicker has staked out liberal positions on guns, health care, abortion, education, and gay rights worthy of anyone billing herself as a progressive. She also has described herself as a married bisexual.

Dicker said she got involved with Philadelphia politics in 2003 after attending a Howard Dean presidential campaign event at a bar in Northern Liberties.

Her involvement in the Dean campaign evolved into Philly For Change, a progressive grassroots organization that later backed Nutter's candidacy. The group also has endorsed her.

In the 2006 state House primary, she ran against two candidates backed by Fumo and Dougherty and finished second by about 200 votes to the Dougherty-supported candidate, Mike O'Brien, who went on to win the general election.

"I'm not a smoke-filled-back-room dealer," said Dicker, whose clear diction sets her apart from the sometimes rambling Dougherty and the nasal Farnese.

A 1994 graduate of Middlebury College in Vermont, she moved to Philadelphia in 1998 to a take a job as an economic analyst for South Jersey-based Spencer's Gifts.

Here, the Queen Village resident met and married Simon Dicker, a university astronomer and physicist. A competitive swimmer in high school, Dicker now enjoys long-distance bicycle rides with her husband, including a trip from Philadelphia to a West Virginia observatory two years ago.

Dicker is not inclined to take a negative view of her prospects, but she is vowing to not go away if she loses.

"If I don't make it, and John Dougherty does win, I am completely committed to taking him on again to make sure he does not become the monster he could," she said.