Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy

9.30 a.m. School run has become impossible outfit obstacle. It is that confusing time before summer has got its confidence going, when you keep leaving the house either in winter woollies, at which it turns out to be sunny and 26 degrees, or wearing a floaty summer dress, and then it starts hailing, leaving you freezing to death whilst noticing your toenail polish is revolting. Must turn attention to clothes and grooming. Also writing.

Thursday 9 May 2013

7 p.m. Gaah! Just watched Good Luck Charlie on Disney Channel with Mabel and realized the mum in Good Luck Charlie wears outfits exactly like I have been wearing all winter – apart from the navy silk dress: black jeans tucked into boots, or tight black flared sweatpants when at home, a white scoop-necked vest and a V-necked sweater on top in either black, grey or some other muted colour. Has what I thought was my monochrome, slightly edgy dressing become, in Mabel’s eyes, the equivalent of Mum and Una’s former Country Casuals two-pieces? Maybe will try to be more eclectic, like Good Luck Charlie teenage daughter.

Monday 13 May 2013

Minutes spent on outfit websites 242, minutes spent looking at Yahoo! stories 27, minutes spent arguing with Mr Wallaker 12, minutes spent listening to Jude 32, minutes spent on homework chart 52, minutes spent doing any work whatsoever 0.

9.30 a.m. Right. Must get down to some serious writing now, but will just have a quick look at websites for River Island, Zara and Mango, etc. to get ideas for updated summer outfits.

12.30 p.m. Right! Work! Will just check Unexploded Email Inbox.

12.45 p.m. Ooh, Yahoo! story: ‘Biel Disappoints in Less-Than-Sexy Pantsuit.’ Pah! Are women now judged by the Distance-From-Sexiness of their pantsuits? V. relevant to Hedda updating. Vital to read.

1 p.m. In frenzy of indignation. I mean, honestly, the only role models women have these days are these . . . these RED CARPET GIRLS who just turn up at events wearing clothes that people have loaned to them, then have their photos taken, which appear in Grazia, then go home again to sleep until lunchtime and get some more free clothes. Not that Jessica Biel is a Red Carpet Girl. Is actress. But still.

1.15 p.m.

Wish I was a Red Carpet Girl.

2.15 p.m. Maybe will go out and get Grazia magazine so as not to disappoint in less-than-sexy mother-from-Good Luck Charlie outfit. Not, of course, that mother in Good Luck Charlie is less than sexy.

3 p.m. Just back from newsagent’s with new Grazia magazine. Realize whole of my style is outdated and wrong and must wear skinny jeans, ballet pumps and shirt buttoned up to the collar, and blazer for school run plus enormous handbag and sunglasses in manner of celebrity at airport. Gaah! Is time to pick up Billy and Mabel.

5 p.m. Back home. Billy came out of school looking traumatized.

‘I came second bottom in the spelling test.’

‘What spelling test?’ I stared at him aghast as the other boys poured down the steps.

‘It was an epic fail,’ he said sadly. ‘Even Ethekiel Koutznestov got better than me.’

Terrible sense of failure. Whole homework thing is completely incomprehensible with random bits of paper, pictures of multi-armed Indian gods and half-coloured-in recipes for toast in different books.

Mr Pitlochry-Howard, Billy’s anxious, bespectacled form teacher, hurried up to us.

‘The spelling test is nothing to worry about,’ he said anxiously. Mr Wallaker wandered up to eavesdrop. ‘Billy’s a very bright boy, he just needs—’

‘He needs more organization at home,’ said Mr Wallaker.

‘But, you see, Mr Wallaker,’ said Mr Pitlochry-Howard, blushing slightly, ‘Billy has had a very difficult—’

‘Yes, I know what happened to Billy’s father,’ Mr Wallaker said quietly.

‘So we must make some allowances. It will be fine, Mrs Darcy. You are not to worry,’ said Mr Pitlochry-Howard. Then he pottered off, leaving me glowering at Mr Wallaker.

‘Billy needs discipline and structure,’ he said. ‘That’s what will help him.’

‘He does have discipline. And he gets enough of your sort of discipline on the sports field. And in the chess class.’

‘You call that discipline? Wait till he gets to boarding school.’

‘Boarding school?’ I said, thinking of how Mark had made me promise not to send them away like him. ‘He’s not going to boarding school.’

‘What’s wrong with boarding school? My boys are at boarding school. Pushes them to their limits, teaches them valour, courage—’

‘What about when things go wrong? What about someone to listen to them when they don’t win? What about fun, what about love and cuddles?’