December 5, 2004

3:17 AM

My daughter (18) is a great fan of Bridget Jones. On her Christmas list this year is 'a diary'. Putting 2 and 2 together, I have been searching for a Bridget Jones Diary er, Diary (if you see what I mean).

You know the kind of thing. Imagine a "Winnie the Pooh" Diary with pictures and information (as well as being a diary too). But with stuff from the Bridget Jones Film.

Can't find one anywhere. Have the marketing people missed this wonderful opportunity for Christmas and 2005?
posted by JtJ to (15 comments total)

Ooh, no. You've got the right idea, I think, but I don't see why the diary has to be Bridget Jones-themed at all. I think if I were her (and 18 was only four years ago for me), I would want a quality diary similar to what Bridget had, but I would find a Bridget-themed diary (if such a thing even exists) childish and overdone. I could imagine the Christmas dialogue now:

"It's a diary! Yay! Oh, wait...it's a Bridget Jones diary. Oh jeez, Dad!"

"What? Don't you like Bridget Jones? Didn't you want a diary?"

"Well, yeah, but..."

I say get her a really nice, high-quality, beautiful journal and a good pen to go with it. In fact, when I was 18, I asked for a journal from this company for Christmas (well, journal cover + journal insert). Four years later, I'm still using it, and I think I'm going to stick with it for life. Barring that, you can always find beautiful leather or cloth journals, or ones with this or that beautiful art print on it. And I vote for nice, thick, unruled pages, because then she can sketch as well as write.

This way, she can make the diary her own. I may be missing the mark here, and of course you know your daughter far better than I do, but themed journals have always struck me as more for kids/younger teenagers. I think she's bound to stick with something non-themed for longer.
posted by fricative at 3:47 AM on December 5, 2004

i think fricative is probably right. but what i know about 18 year old girlswomen is, well, minimal.

(a nice hand-made notebook - you can get them with, say, silk covers - might be ok, too, but i think having a date on each page is perhaps more what's expected. i guess a notebook would be a "journal", not a diary. why on earth am i writing ask-me replies about 18 year olds? because i can't fix this damn bug is why. oh well, back to work...)
posted by andrew cooke at 5:04 AM on December 5, 2004

Bridget Jones' Livejournal is an option, as well.
posted by waxpancake at 5:13 AM on December 5, 2004

It's probably best to not get her a Bridge Jones Diary, unless you want her to constantly complain about being fat and about sleeping with slimey men.

Seriously though, my 24 year-old fiancee says to not bother finding a 'bridget jones' diary with stuff from the movie in it. It sounds too much like Teen Beat. Perhaps find a diary that fits her personality.
posted by Arch Stanton at 5:58 AM on December 5, 2004

There's a Roma Lussa Journal that you can get. When I bought it for a friend, I wanted to keep for myself as soon as I laid hands on it. It's lovely, leather-bound with creamy soft pages and it comes with a leather string binding.
posted by Navek Rednam at 6:53 AM on December 5, 2004

Completely agree with fricative. A journal or diary with any sort of branding on it will feel too childish. I think she really does just mean "diary" and not a "Bridget Jones Diary." You can find some very nice ones here, including the type of cover fricative linked to. You might want to get a feel from her for size--the smaller the diary the more cramped the physical act of writing is.

Giving someone a journal is a bit like giving a mouse a cookie: Your daughter may want to carry the journal around everywhere she goes, so another gift idea is a really great bag.
posted by idest at 7:09 AM on December 5, 2004

If you're still in need of it, ask the person who sponsers this bid what exactly the 'One official BRIDGET JONES diary' is. It sounds like the person is selling off some swag.
posted by sleslie at 7:33 AM on December 5, 2004

fricative is completely right...get her something grown-up that she wouldn't feel embarassed taking off to college or letting her friends see. also, I've found that refillable journals like the one fricative linked to are better for impulsively tearing pages out without ruining a beautiful bound book. I'm 29 and much less impulsive than I was 10 years ago, but I still feel the need to rip out a page now and then.
posted by gokart4xmas at 8:33 AM on December 5, 2004

Jeepers Navek! That is a NICE journal!
posted by hughbot at 9:06 AM on December 5, 2004

Not fer nuthin', but I'm a huge fan of Carta Products, and their lovely journals. They aren't branded as any sort of diary or anything (no dates, quotes of the day, etc), but if you need beautiful books full of paper to write in, Carta is the way to go. Different vendors carry different products, but I've used Vickerey before, and their service and quality is wonderful. (Take a look around the rest of Vickerey -- they have a wealth of beautifully designed products that might appeal to an 18-year-old young woman.)
posted by Hankins at 10:20 AM on December 5, 2004

I have to agree with everyone else and say that a nice unbranded diary would be the better option. By getting a diary that would suit her personality would definately get brownie points, showing that you have still put a lot of thought into the present and haven't just picked any old one off the shelf.

Navek's suggestion is a very yummy option tho!
posted by floanna at 11:54 AM on December 5, 2004

Thank you fricative and navek, you just helped me loads with my seasonal shopping.
posted by tetsuo at 12:42 PM on December 5, 2004

People....Thank You!

You've saved me an embarrassing mistake.
I'll look through all those links but I think you're right. The Bridget Jones idea was a bit Dad-ish.

Still can't believe that no-one's selling a BJ Diary Diary though!
posted by JtJ at 1:05 PM on December 5, 2004

Now, a BJ Diary Diary is a different thing again...
posted by twine42 at 3:17 PM on December 5, 2004

This was a sweet initial idea, but consider that even if a real Bridget Jones diary did exist, it would probably have pre-typed blanks for "number of alcohol units consumed" as well as weight and perhaps even number of shags etc., which might not exactly be the sort of thing you'd want for your daughter anyway. The nice diary plan seems a good thing all around.
posted by onlyconnect at 5:03 PM on December 5, 2004