Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy Read online

Thursday 17 May 2012

  175lb, Twitter followers 0.

  9.45 a.m. On point of Obesity Clinic departure. Feel have got to lowest ebb ever. Will be like one of those people you see in medical news reports looking ashamed of themselves, having their blood pressure taken in hospital gowns while a trim, streamlined reporter talks in front of them in stern, concerned tones, about the ‘Obesity Epidemic’.

  10 p.m. Obesity Clinic was FANTASTIC. After initial awkwardness of having to repeat ‘The Obesity Clinic’ increasingly loudly to the receptionist, eventually reached the clinic, to see a man who was so large he was actually wheeling his fat on a trolley in front of him. He seemed to be being hit on by an only slightly less large woman who was saying to him in a seductive voice, ‘Were you Childhood Obese?’

  People were looking at me, with the sort of admiration I hadn’t felt since I was twenty-two and running round in a psychedelic shirt tied up in a knot revealing my flat midriff. Realized they must think I was one of the clinic’s success stories nearing the end of my ‘programme’. Felt unaccustomed, leaping sense of self-confidence. Realized this was wrong, and disrespectful to fellow patients.

  Also, the very fact of seeing fat as a separate body attachment being wheeled on a trolley started to make me see fat as an actual thing. Realize, in the past, have seen fat as some totally unreasonable, random act of nature rather than a direct product of things-put-in-mouth.

  ‘Name,’ said the man on reception, who, worryingly, was very fat himself. Surely the people who work at the clinic ought to have got this one down by now?

  The whole thing was medical and complex: blood tests, ECGs and consultations. Once we got over the moment of awkwardness when they tried to put me down on the form as a ‘geriatric mother’ it all went absolutely swimmingly. Seems like the whole thing of weighing yourself is not the point. The point is to drop dress sizes. And people who are very, very fat – say fifty or a hundred pounds overweight – can lose a lot – like twelve pounds of fat in one week! And that is actual fat. But if you’re just trying to lose 10, 15 per cent of your body weight, anything more than a couple of pounds isn’t losing fat, it’s (darkly) other things.

  You see, crucially, is not about weight but the percentage of fat to muscle. If you just go on a crash diet, and do not lift weights, you end up losing your muscles, which are heavier than your fat. So you weigh less, but are more fat. Or something. Anyway, upshot is: am supposed to go to gym.

  My diet is going to be just protein chocolate puddings and protein chocolate bars, then a small portion of protein and vegetables in the evenings, so I mustn’t put anything in my mouth which isn’t those things. (Apart from penises – why did mind think such a thought? Chance would be a fine thing, though after today it is suddenly looking like that might be a possibility.)

  MAKEOVER!

  Thursday 24 May 2012

  179lb (huh), pounds lost 0, Twitter followers 0, protein chocolate bars consumed 28, chocolate protein puddings consumed 37, number of meals replaced by protein chocolate bars or puddings 0, average number of calories per day eaten combining normal food with protein products 4,798.

  Just went to Obesity Clinic for first week’s progress weigh-in.

  ‘Bridget,’ said the nurse, ‘you’re supposed to replace the meals with the protein products, not eat them as well.’

  Looked sulkily at the chart then blurted out, ‘Will you follow me on Twitter?’

  ‘I am not,’ she said, ‘on Twitter. Now, next week, forget about Twitter and just eat the products. Nothing else. OK?’

  9.15 p.m. Children are asleep. Oh God, I’m so lonely, Twitter follower-less, fat, hungry and sick of effing obesity products. Hate this time of day when children are asleep. Should be relaxing and fun instead of just lonely. Right. Am not going to wallow in it. In next three months am going to:

  * Lose 75lb

  * Gain 75 Twitter followers

  * Write 75 pages of screenplay

  * Learn to operate television

  * Find friend with children same age who lives nearby so whole evening is fun instead of chaos followed by grated-cheese stuffing-fest

  Yes! That is what I need. Is not natural for children to be isolated in individual houses with one or two adults focusing far too much attention on their happiness, scared to let them play in the street for fear of paedophiles. Sure there must have been paedophiles when we were growing up, but mass-media-induced fear of paedophiles has changed the whole face of parenting. Need other parents to spontaneously talk and drink wine with while children play, so whole thing would be like extended Italian family having dinner under a tree. For as the saying goes, ‘It takes a whole village to raise a child.’

  Also, to get a celebrity ready for the red carpet.

  Actually, there is a nice woman I have seen opposite who seems to have children – though ‘nice’ is perhaps the wrong word. She is wildly bohemian, with mane of black hair topped off with things that would be more at home in a garden centre or pet shop than on a head. Whole thing might look strange were it not for her equally outlandish dark bohemian beauty. Have seen her along with other people coming and going: children, teenagers – nannies? mannies? lovers? – a ruggedly handsome man who may be a husband, or a visiting artist, and, from time to time, a baby. Maybe she has kids the same age?

  Feeling more jolly now. Tomorrow will be better.

  Thursday 31 May 2012

  175lb

  Yayy! Have lost 4lbs since last week! Am back to weight at start of diet. Though nurse says loss is not really fat but ‘other things’. Also says I need to start e.g. cycling instead of sitting on my arse all day.

  Thursday 7 June 2012

  171lb

  10 a.m. Have embraced the bike-borrowing scheme of our eccentric (i.e. sensible) mayor, Boris Johnson – bought Boris Bike key, and borrowed Boris Bike and everything! Suddenly feel part of cool bicycling London: whole world of carefree young people eschewing cars and being lean and green! Am going to cycle to Obesity Clinic.

  10.30 a.m. Just returned, traumatized from bike ride. Completely terrifying. Kept feeling had forgotten to put seat belt on, and getting off whenever a car came. Maybe will go on canal towpath.

  11.30 a.m. Just back from canal ride on bike. Went really well until someone threw an egg at me from a bridge. Or maybe it was a bird which went into sudden early labour. Will clean off egg, not do Boris Bikes any more and go to Obesity Clinic on bus. At least will be alive and clean when sitting on arse instead of dead and covered in egg.

  Thursday 14 June 2012

  167lb!

  Keep repeatedly taking off clothes and getting on scales, then taking off watch, bracelet, etc. and staring delightedly at dial. Just makes me want to do diet more.

  Wednesday 20 June 2012

  1 p.m. Have just been to gym – which is good, though hideous, obviously. Also what is the law which says that when changing room is empty except for one other person, their locker will always be the one directly above yours?

  Now am going to got back on Twitter and find people.

  1.30 p.m.

  <@DalaiLama Just as a snake sheds its skin, so we must shed our past again and again.>

  You see? The Dalai Lama and I are one cyber-mind. I am shedding my fat like a snake.

  Wednesday 27 June 2012

  9.30 a.m. Have started my Hedda Gabbler screenplay. Is really very relevant because it is about a girl living in Norway – which I am going to translate to Queen’s Park – who decides ‘her dancing days are over’ and nobody lovely is going to actually marry her, so goes for someone boring – like grabbing the last seat when the music stops in musical chairs. Maybe I will also make her lose loads of weight and get millions of Twitter followers.

  10 a.m. Maybe not. Twitter followers 0.

  Thursday 28 June 2012

  159lb, pounds lost 16!

  OMG. Have lost 16 lbs! The strange thing is, where hundreds and hundreds of diets over the years have failed or lasted five days, this one
is actually . . .

  . . . working! It is something about going every week and being weighed and having my fat-to-muscle ratio measured, and knowing I can’t cheat and tell myself am on the Hay Diet when I want a baked potato and the Weightwatchers diet when I want a Mars bar. Also just found I can fit into dress I had before I was pregnant (though admittedly tent-shaped) and that has whipped me into a frenzy of optimism.

  Thursday 12 July 2012

  155lb, pounds lost 20, pages of screenplay written 10, Twitter followers 0.

  9.15 p.m. Oh God, I’m so lonely. Right. Am going to really get going on Twitter.

  9.20 p.m. Dalai Lama has 2 million followers and yet he follows no one. That is right. A god cannot follow others. Wonder if he actually tweets himself or does he get his assistant to do it?

  9.30 p.m. Complete meltdown. Lady Gaga has 33 million followers! Why am I even bothering? Twitter is giant popularity contest which I am doomed to be the worst at.

  9.35 p.m. Just texted Tom explaining that Lady Gaga has 33 million followers and I have zero followers.

  9.40 p.m.

 

 

  10 p.m. @TomKat37 has 878 followers. How did he manage that?

  Friday 13 July 2012

  10.15 p.m. I’ve got a follower! You see. People are starting to notice my style.

  10.16 p.m. Oh. <@TomKat37 You see? You’ve got a follower. Now keep going.>

  Is just Tom.

  Tuesday 17 July 2012

  152lb. Twitter followers 1.

  Noon. Glorious and historic day. Just went shopping to H&M and asked the assistant to bring me a 16 and she looked at me as if I was mad and said, ‘You need a 14.’

  I scoffed, ‘I’ll never fit into a 14,’ and she brought it, and it fitted. I am a 14!

  And I have a follower! Am practically viral.

  Thursday 26 July 2012

  149lb, pages of screenplay 25, Twitter followers 1.

  Yayy! Have broken through 150lb glass floor (though may have been through standing on one leg and slightly leaning on washbasin).

  Also am on total screenwriting roll. Have decided to call my screenplay The Leaves in His Hair, which is Hedda’s most famous line in Hedda Gabbler. Even though it is only famous because nobody understands what she means.

  Monday 30 July 2012

  148lb, Twitter followers 50,001.

  9.15 p.m. I’ve got another follower! But a weird follower. It’s a follower with 50,000 followers.

  9.35 p.m. What is it? It’s just sort of hovering there like a spaceship, watching silently. Feel I ought to fire on it or something.

  9.40 p.m. It’s called XTC Communications.

  10 p.m. Just tweeted whole weird-follower scenario to Tom, who tweeted back.

  <@TomKat37 @JoneseyBJ It’s a spambot, baby. It’s just marketing.>

  10.30 p.m. Tee hee. Just replied:

  <@JoneseyBJ @TomKat37 I already have a spambot. You should have seen it today in the harsh rays of the early morning sun.>

  Tuesday 31 July 2012

  Twitter followers 50,001.

  2 p.m. FIFTY THOUSAND AND ONE FOLLOWERS. Feeling fabulous! Just bought lip plumper! It feels a bit funny but actually seems to work.

  3 p.m. Wonder if put lip plumper on hands will get fat fingers?

  Wednesday 1 August 2012

  Twitter followers 1 again.

  7 a.m. Humph. Spambot has just, like, gone, taking its 50,000 bloody followers with it. Gaah! Kids are awake.

  9.15 p.m. Will just check Twitter.

  9.20 p.m. Tom has ‘retweeted’ my spambot tweet and seven followers have come.

  9.50 p.m. What should I do now, though? Should I greet them? Welcome them?

  9.51 p.m. Follow them?

  10 p.m. Paralyzed into silence by social-media embarrassment. Maybe will not do Twitter any more.

  Thursday 2 August 2012

  142lb, pounds lost 33, muscles grown 5% (whatever that means).

  1 p.m. Giddily euphoric! Just went to Obesity Clinic and nurse says I am now ahead of target and model patient. Then went to H&M again to check size and am a 12.

  Am thin and not a heron! Am Uma Thurman! Am Jemima Khan!

  2 p.m. Just nipped into Marks & Spencer to purchase celebratory chocolate mousse cake and have eaten whole thing like a polar bear taking great swipes out with his paw.

  Friday 3 August 2012

  145lb (emergency).

  10 a.m. Chocolate mousse cake has, I swear, moved directly from my mouth to my stomach and is just sitting there, under my skin, like the foil bag inside a cheap wine-box. Must abandon screenplay, career, etc. and go to gym.

  Noon. Am never going to gym again. Am never going to lose the weight, never and don’t bloody well care. Was consumed with rage whilst lying on front with bum in air failing to lift weight bar with ankles. Looked round to see everyone contorted ludicrously in machines like Hieronymous Bosch painting.

  Why are bodies so difficult to manage? Why? ‘Oh, oh, look at me, I’m a body, I’m going to splurge fat unless you, like, STARVE yourself and go to undignified TORTURE CENTRES and don’t eat anything nice or get drunk.’ Hate diet. Is all fault of SOCIETY. Am just going to be old and fat and eat whatever I like and NEVER HAVE SEX AGAIN and WHEEL MY FAT AROUND ON A TROLLEY.

  Sunday 5 August 2012

  Weight (unknown, daren’t look).

  11 p.m. Have today consumed the following things.

  *2 ‘Healthy Start’ (i.e. 482 calories each) muffins

  *Full English breakfast with sausages, scrambled egg, bacon, tomatoes and fried bread

  *Pizza Express pizza

  *Banana split

  *2 packets of Rolos

  *Half a Marks & Spencer chocolate cheesecake (actually, if am honest, whole of a Marks & Spencer cheesecake)

  *2 glasses Chardonnay

  *2 packets cheese and onion crisps

  *1 bag grated cheese

  *1 12-inch jelly ‘snake’ purchased at the Odeon cinema

  *1 bag popcorn (large)

  *1 hot dog (large)

  *Remains of 2 hot dogs (large)

  HARHARBLOODY HAR. Put that in your pipe and smoke it, society!

  Thursday 9 August 2012

  152lb, weight gained since last week: 10lbs (though maybe chocolate cheesecake is still intact in stomach?)

  2 p.m. Could hardly bring self to go to Obesity Clinic as was so ashamed.

  Nurse took one look at scales, marched me into the doctor, and then made me go into the Group Therapy room, where everyone else talked about their ‘eating relapses’. Actually it was great. Mine was definitely the best and everyone seemed deeply impressed.

  9.15 p.m. In spite of – or perhaps proving – nurse’s lecture (‘it takes three days to create a habit and three weeks to break it’), just want to eat cake and cheese again, and go back next week and impress everyone even more.

  9.30 p.m. Just called Tom, grated cheese falling out of my mouth, and explained the whole thing.

  ‘Nooo! Don’t start trying to out-relapse obese people!’ he said. ‘What about Twitter? Have you followed your followers? Follow Talitha.’

  9.45 p.m. Tom just tweeted me Talitha’s Twitter address.

  9.50 p.m. @Talithaluckybitch has 146,000 followers. Hate Talitha. Hate Twitter. Feel like eating cheese again, or Talitha.

  9.52 p.m. Just tweeted Tom: <@JoneseyBJ @TomKat37 Talitha has 146,000 followers.>

  <@TomKat37 @JoneseyBJ Don’t worry dear, they’re mostly people she’s slept with or been married to.>

  10.00 p.m. Talitha tweeted back.

  <@Talithaluckybitch @TomKat37 @JoneseyBJ Darling it’s really TERRIBLY vulgar to display the green-eyed monster on Twitter.>

  Friday 10 August 2012

  Twitter followers 75, then 102, then 57, then probabl
y none, by now.

  7.15 a.m. 75 followers have mysteriously, silently appeared overnight.

  9.15 p.m. 102 now. Feel overwhelmed by responsibility: like am leader of a cult and they will all jump into a lake or something if I tell them to. Maybe will have glass of wine.

  9.30 pm. Must clearly show leadership and address followers.

  <@JoneseyBJ Welcome followers. I am thy leader. Ye art most welcome to my cult.>

  <@JoneseyBJ But please do not do anything weird like jump into a lake, even if I suggest it, as may be drunk.>

  9.45 p.m <@JoneseyBJ Gaah! 41 one of ye followers have drained away as suddenly as ye first appeared.>

  <@JoneseyBJ Comest thou back!>

  Thursday 16 August 2012

  137lb, pages of screenplay written 45, Twitter followers 97.

  4.30 p.m. Twitter followers have surged back and multiplied, rather like Pinocchio’s broomstick. Is clearly sign or portent. Weight is coming off again, have finished Act Two of screenplay, well sort of, and just had sighting of bohemian neighbour.

  Was trying to park car. This is impossible in our street as is narrow, curved and cars park on both sides. Had just reversed in and out of space fourteen times, then resorted to Braille Parking, i.e. forcing car into space by bumping cars in front and behind. Braille Parking is fine in our street because everyone does it, then every so often a delivery lorry charges through, scraping everyone, someone takes its number and we all get our dents done on the insurance.

  ‘Mummeee!’ said Billy. ‘There’s someone in the car you bumped.’

  The bohemian neighbour was sitting in the front seat, yelling at the kids in the back. I knew we were kindred spirits. She climbed out of the car, followed by her two dark, wild-looking children. They looked the same age as Billy and Mabel: older boy, younger girl! Then the bohemian neighbour looked at her bumper, grinned at me, and disappeared into her house.

  We have initiated contact! We are on the friendship road! As long as she does not behave like the spambot.

  Thursday 23 August 2012

  135lb, pounds lost 40 (unbelievable), dress sizes dropped 3.

  Historic and joyful day. Have not got fat anything. Obesity Clinic says have now got down to healthy weight and should go on ‘Maintenance’ and losing more weight is only for aesthetic reasons and not because they think I need it!