Daisy Kay

Presence is v.good for paper's image 
The Independent have been telling us for weeks that Helen Fielding will resurrect her Bridget Jones column, and now that day is finally upon us.

If you’ve read the two books or seen both films starring Renee Zellweger, Colin Firth and Hugh Grant, you’ll know that hapless singleton Bridget was all loved-up with Mark Darcy.

Now we return to her life on July 31, when she’s had six alcohol units “(but state of emergency)”, weighs 9st 4 and puffed on nine cigarettes “(better)”.

Unsurprisingly, Bridget split up from Mark three months ago, but five days ago they had a “not-back-together-shag”. Her mother calls to make sure she’s “safe” during these war-torn times and talks about someone in the family having their third child.

“Have reached the age when my own mother has given up passive aggressively encouraging me to have children,” she writes.

But the column doesn’t just work because Fielding captures the neurosis of a single thirty-something woman; it works because she humorously reflects our neurosis during these ‘fragile’ times.

Bridget comments on the constant helicopters and sirens in London and has the “panicky realisation that we’re really in a war, coupled with pride at how well am personally handling the crisis”.

“Not entirely sure where pride comes from as have not exactly done anything except resolving to take trainers to work when wearing unsuitable shoes. But still.”

She unleashes her panic about the state of the world, Mark and her old ex, Daniel Cleaver, onto her mate Shazzer, who calmly tells her that “they’re both in their forties now, they’re about to go through what we went through when we hit our thirties, and start panicking about losing their sexual power”.

Needless to say, a trip to the Electric for ‘tea’ and then a nice walk, turns into a piss-up and she winds up in bed with one of her exes.

Welcome back, you F**kwit!