Bridget Joness Diary

I am not going to spend another evening being danced about in front of Mark Darcy like a spoonful of puried turnip in front of a baby. I am going to have to leave the country or something.

8 p.m. Off to di

Midnight. Oh dear. Everyone was trying to cheer up the spare man (thirty-seven, newly divorced by wife, sample view: 'I have to say, I do think Michael Howard is somewhat unfairly maligned.').

'Don't know what you're complaining about,' Jeremy was holding forth to him. 'Men get more attractive when they get older and women get less attractive, so all those twenty-two-year-olds who wouldn't look at you when you were twenty-five will be gagging for it.'

I sat, head down, quivering furiously at their inferences of female sell-by dates and life as game of musical chairs where girls without a chair/man when the music stops/they pass thirty are 'out.' Huh. As if.

'Oh yes, I quite agree it's much the best to go for younger partners,' I burst out, airily. 'Men in their thirties are such bores with their hang-ups and obsessive delusions that all women are trying to trap them into marriage. These days I'm only really interested in men in their early twenties. They're so much better able to . . . well, you know . . . '

'Really?' said Magda, rather too eagerly. 'How . . . ?'

'Yes, you're interested,' interjected Jeremy, glaring at Magda. 'But the point is they're not interested in you.'

'Um. Excuse me. My current boyfriend is twenty-three,' I said, sweetly.

There was a stu

Bugger. Where am I going to find a twenty-three-year-old who will come to di

9st, alcohol units 0, cigarettes 4 (v.g.), calories 3222 (British Rail sandwiches hideously impregnated), minutes spent imagining speech will make when resigning from new job 210.

Ugh. Hateful conference with bully-boss Richard Finch going, 'Right. Harrods one-pound-a-pee toilets. I'm thinking Fantasy Toilets. I'm thinking studio: Frank Ski

'But . . . but . . ' I stammered.

'Patchouli!' he shouted, at which point the dogs under his desk woke up and started jumping about and barking.

'Wha'?' yelled Patchouli above the din. She was wearing a crocheted midi-dress with a floppy straw hat and an orange Bri-nylon saddle-stitched blouse on top. As if the things I used to wear in my teens were a hilarious joke.

'Where's the Dole Youths OB?'

'Liverpool.'

'Liverpool. OK, Bridget. OB crew outside Boots in the shopping center, live at five-thirty. Get me six Dole Youths.'

Later, as I was leaving to get the train, Patchouli yelled casually, 'Oh yeah, like, Bridget, it's not Liverpool, it's, like, Manchester, right?'

Number of Dole Youths approached 44, Number of Dole Youths agreed to be interviewed 0.

Manchester-London train 7 p.m. Ugh. By 4:45 I was ru

''Scuse me, are you employed? Never mind. 'hanks!'

'What are we doing, then?' asked the cameraman with no attempt to feign interest. 'Dole Youths,' I said gaily. 'Back in a mo!' then rushed round the corner and hit myself on the forehead. I could hear Richard over my earpiece going, 'Bridget . . . where the fuck . . . ? Dole Youths.' Then I spotted a cash machine on the wall.

By 5:20 six youths claiming to be unemployed were neatly lined up in front of the camera, a crisp ?20 note in each of their pockets while I flapped around trying to make oblique amends for being middle-class. At 5:30 1 heard the signature tune bonging and crashing then Richard yelling, 'Sorry, Manchester, we're dropping you.'

'Urm . . . ' I began, to the expectant faces. The youths clearly thought I had a syndrome that made me want to pretend I worked in TV. Worse, with working like a mad thing all week and coming up to Manchester I had been unable to do anything about the no-date trauma tomorrow. Then suddenly as I glanced across at the divine young whippersnappers, with the cash machine in the background, the genii of an extremely morally suspect idea began to form itself in my mind.

Hmm. Think was right decision not to attempt to lure Dole Youth to Cosmo's di

7:30 p.m. Ugh. 'Smoking Carriage' turned out to be Monstrous Pigsty where smokers were huddled, miserable and defiant. Realize it is no longer possible for smokers to live in dignity, instead being forced to sulk in the slimy underbelly of existence. Would not have been in least surprised if carriage had mysteriously been shunted off onto siding never to be seen again. Maybe privatized rail firms will start ru

'What about Gav?' he said.

'Gav?'

'You know. The guy you met at the Saatchi Gallery.'

'D'you think he'd mind?'

'No. He was really into you.'

'He wasn't. Shut-urrrrp.'

'He was. Stop obsessing. Leave it to me.'

Sometimes feel without Tom I would sink without trace and disappear.

8st 12 (v.g.), alcohol units 3 (v.g.), cigarettes 0 (too shameful to smoke in presence of healthy young whippersnappers).

Blimey, must hurry. About to go on date with Diet Coke-esque young whippersnapper. Gav turned out to be completely divine, and behaved exquisitely at Alex's di

* lust

** put my hand on his knee

*** my panic