Saturday 19 July

9st 3 (why? On bikini-purchase day, why?), confusing thoughts about Daniel: too many, bikini bottoms fitted into1, bikini tops fitted into: half, rude thoughts about Prince William 22, no. of times wrote "Prince William and his lovely date Miss Bridget Jones at Ascot" on Hello! magazine 7.

6.30 p.m. Bloody, bloody, bloody. Have spent all day in changing rooms of Oxford Street trying to squeeze my breasts into bikini tops designed for people with breasts either arranged one on top of the other in the centre of their chests or one under each arm, with the harsh downlighting making me look like River Cafe frittata. Obvious solution is one-piece but then will return with already squashily textured stomach highlighted against rest of body by whiteness.

Urgent bikini diet weight-loss target programme: week I

Sun 20 July 9st3

Mon 21 July 9st2

Tues 22 July 9st I

Wed 23 July 9st 0

Thurs 24 July 8st 13

Fri 25 July 8st 12

Sat 26 July 8st 11

Hurray! So by a week today will be almost down to target weight so then, with body-bulk thus adjusted, all will need to do is alter texture and arrangement of fat through exercise.

Oh fuck. Will never work. Am only sharing a room and probably bed with Shaz. Will concentrate instead on my spirit. Anyway Jude and Shaz are coming round soon. Hurrah!

Midnight. Lovely evening. V. nice to be back with girls again, though Shaz whipped herself up into such a frenzy of indignation about Daniel was all I could do to stop her ringing the police and having him arrested for date rape.

"Redundant? You see?" she was ranting. "Daniel's an absolute archetype of fin-de-millennium male. It's becoming clear to him that women are the superior race. He's realizing he has no role or function so what does he do? He turns to violence."

"Well, he only tried to kiss her," said Jude mildly, flicking idly through the pages of What Marquee.

"Pah! That's exactly the point. She's bloody lucky he didn't burst into her bank dressed as an Urban Warrior and kill seventeen people with a sub-macbine gun."

Just then the phone rang, It was Tom, not, unaccountably, ringing to thank me for sending his mobile back after all the bloody trouble the pesky item has caused but wanting my mum's phone number. Tom seems to be quite pally with mum, seeing her in what I suspect is a Judy Garland/Ivana Trump kitsch sort of way (which is odd since only last year I remember Mum lecturing me on how gayness was 'just laziness, darling, they simply can't be bothered to relate to the opposite sex' - but then that was last year). Suddenly feared that Tom was going to ask my mother to perform 'Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien' in a sequinned dress in a club called Pump, which she would - naively yet egomaniacally - agree to, thinking it was something to do with ancient machinery in Cotswold Mill Houses.

"What do you want it for" I said suspiciously.

"Isn't she in a book club?"

"Dunno. Anything's possible, Why?"

"Jerome's sensing his poems are ready, so I'm finding him book club venues. He did one last week in Stoke Newington and it was awesome."

"Awesome?" I said, doing a bulging-cheeked vomit face at Jude and Shaz. Ended up giving Tom the number in spite of reservations, as suspect Mum might be needing another diversion now Wellington has gone.

"What is it about book clubs?" I said when I'd put the phone down. "Is it just me, or have they suddenly sprung up from nowhere. Should we be in one or do you have to be Smug Married?"

"You have to be Smug Married," said Shaz definitively. "That's because they fear their minds are being sucked dry by the paternalistic demands of ... Oh my God, look at Prince William."

"Let me look," interrupted Jude, snatching the copy of Hello! with its photo of the lithe young royal whippersnapper. Tried not to snatch it myself. Although, clearly, wish to admire as many pictures of Prince William as possible, preferably in a range of outfits, realize urge is both intrusive and wrong. Cannot, though, ignore impression of great things fermenting around in young royal brain, and sense that, at maturity, will rise up like ancient knight of Round Table thrusting sword in air and creating dazzling new order, which will make President Clinton and Tony Blair look like passe elderly gentlemen.

"How young is too young, would you say?" said Jude dreamily.

"Too young to be your legal son," said Shaz definitively as if was already part of government statute: which suppose it is, come to think of it, depending bow old you are. Just then the phone rang again.

"Oh, hello, darling. Guess what?" My mother. "Your friend Tom - you know the 'homo' - well, he's bringing a poet to read at the Lifeboat Book Club! He's going to read us romantic poems. Like Lord Byron! Isn't that fun?"

"Er ... yes?" I floundered.

"Actually, it's nothing special," she sniffed airily. "We often have visiting authors."

"Really? Like who?'

"Oh, lots of them, darling. Penny's very good friends with Salman Rushdie. Anyway, you will be coming, darling, won't you?"

"When is it?"

"A week on Friday. Una and I are doing vol-au-vents hot with Chunky Chicken."

A sudden fear convulsed me. "Are Admiral and Elaine Darcy coming?"

"Durr! No boys allowed, silly. Elaine's coming but the chaps are turning up later."

"But Tom and Jerome are coming." "Oh, they're not boys, darling."

"Are you sure Jerome's poems will be the sort of thing that . . ."

"Bridget. I don't know what you're trying to say. We weren't born yesterday, you know. And the whole point about literature is free expression. Ooh, and I think Mark's coming along later. He's up doing Malcolm's will with him - You never know?"

Friday I August

9st 3 (total failure of bikini diet), cigarettes 19 (diet aid), calories 625 (not too late, surely).

6.30 p.m. Grr. Grrr. Leaving for Thailand tomorrow, nothing is packed and had failed to realize that "a week on Friday" for book club is to-bloody-night. Really, really do not want to drive all way to Grafton Underwood. Is hot steamy evening and Jude and Shaz are going to lovely party at River Cafe. Obviously, though, is important to support Mum, Tom's love life, Art etc. Is respecting self by respecting others. Also does not matter if tired tomorrow when get on plane as going on holiday. Sure trip-preparation will not take long as only need capsule wardrobe (just a couple of bodies and a sarong!) and packing always expands to fill the time available so best use of time, surely, is to make time available v. short. Yes! You see! So will do everything

Midnight.

Just back. Arrived v. late owing to typical motorway signpost debacle (if war today, better, surely, to confuse Germans by leaving signposts up?). Was greeted by Mum, wearing a very strange maroon velvet kaftan which presume she intended to be literary.

"How's Salman?" I said as she tut-tutted about my lateness.

"Oh, we decided to do chicken instead," she said sniffily, leading me through the ripply-glassed French doors, into the lounge where the first thing I noticed was a garish new "family crest" above the fake stone fireplace saying 'Hakuna Matata'.

"Shh," said Una, holding a finger up, enraptured. Pretentious Jerome, pierced nipple clearly visible through black wet-look vest, was standing in front of the cut-glass dish collection, bellowing belligerently: "I watch his hard, bony, horny, hams. I watch, I want, I grab," at a semi-circle of appalled Jaeger-be-two-pieced Lifeboat Luncheon Book Club ladies on reproduction Regency dining chairs. Across the room I saw Mark Darcy's mum, Elaine, sporting an expression of suppressed amusement.

"I want," Jerome bellowed on. "I seize his horny, hairy, hams. I have to have. I heave, I hump, I . . ."