Our modest little The Archers thread has its very own radio celebrity! Join us for the hottest chilli in town, and await the impending doom as all plans go into reverse in Ambridge.

[PseudoBadger]

It's all getting rather delicious. I feel sorry for Kenton the fool

I have been wading around in the wind, rain and mud on a farm all afternoon and now have a distinct feeling of wellbeing. And we have lambs too !

Cold Comfort Farm.It's not about farming, more about repressed sexual desires. It's very funny. Give it a go Topaz

It's snowing here too - though we aren't farmers. But there are several in the area. brr!

I've always been indifferent to Ruth but I have found her (and David) exceedingly annoying over the past few months. Pip is the archer I dislike the most- especially the new incarnation!!

Sorry should have said " it's NOT really about farming"....

What's really irritated me about Ruth in recent months is the whole stupid business of having a panic about a road that might never happen coupled with an assumption that it was a sensible thing to do to spend thousands of pounds uprooting the entire family - including jeopardising her children's education - just so that she could be near her mother. Yes, that would be the mother who seems to have been coping fine without Ruth for months, and about whom Ruth was so unconcerned that she couldn't be bothered to have her to stay at Christmas.

I thought the Feebs/Hayley scenes were really moving, genuinely good acting from both... In fact both these storylines were so important it seemed odd to have them interwoven together in a way, both high drama. I really feel for Feebs - hadn't realised Hayley has a job in Brum so more permanent now... I think she'll chose to stay with Roy, she seemed so genuinely cut up about the divorce

I think Jill should probably have let the dust settle a tad before playing the Archer card... It did seem a bit MIL in your face... Good news for Bett and Freda now though, maybe Heatherpet can move in with them!

How is this thread already on page 18?

Loved that episode. Angry angry Ruth and poor Pheebs

I find Cold Comfort Farm so hilarious TopazRocks that I can only read it in short goes. It is one of my all time favourites.

I'll add you with cheminotte to my "Likes Ruth" list.

I think Ruth annoys me because of Cheminotte's "partner in the business" thing. OK, compared to Jill's generation where the men did manly things and the women stayed in the kitchen she's fairly feminist. But holding down a job is no big shakes in her generation, everyone else - Shula, Lizzie, Caroline, Jolene, Kathy, Usha - seems able to do it without making a big song and dance about it. And they manage to run a household at the same time. Why is Ruth so determinedly awful at household things?

I will add to the love of Cold Comfort Farm. It is funny and charming and bonkers.

Possibly one of the annoyances with Ruth is the strange accent. it isn't truly, genuinely Northumberland. The actress does put it on a bit and it sounds overdone at times.

I wonder about the 'determined awfulness' at houseworkery though. Is it a rule then that having a vagina means you have to be interested in domestics? She is very good at the animal husbandry stuff , multitasking etc. so in theory she could do the kitchen stuff, but maybe she just isn't interested? Yet, of the pair (she and David) she tends to be the one who does the groceries and other shopping for the family, presumably also feeds the washing machine, so maybe she isn't that rubbish. She just doesn't like cooking, it seems. And compared with her MIL who likes cooking and doesn't seem to have done lots of farm work, she could never compete. It's not a bad portrayal of the differences between the generations really. Esp. if now there is going to be some kind of a rift. I await events with interest.

I quite Ruth too.
In the event of a divorce they won't have to sell the farm just divide it in two...oh hang on a minute

Oh and I thought the scene between her and Jill was very well acted. Jill barely able to hide her happiness under diplomacy and oblivious to the absolute seething menace in Ruth's "yeh". As David scooted out of the way. Ok bombshell dropped, break in the rain, see ya.

I had a horrible feeling something's going to happen to David when he went out in the rain and dark....

I 'get' Ruth's ineptness in the kitchen and she probably never felt it was fully her kitchen anyway. Shula snapped out instructions to her on where to put dishes last time there was a family meal at Brookfield and it reminded me of one of my SiLs.

It depends how you're feeling when you read it Topaz. I was more than usually miserable at the time and read the whole thing with a stony face - having completely forgetten it was supposed to be funny.

(My phone btw clearly cares more about 20th century sci fi than 19th century drama. I actually meant Chekhov.)

I don't find Ruth any more annoying than I do other characters but that isn't saying much

Excellent scenes yesterday however. I thought david was a coward for buggering off leaving Ruth with jill. Yes there's stuff to do and probably a good idea to let things sink in for ruth on her own for a bit. And I don't want a MIL/DIL thing either. But it felt like he was chickening out

The Archers belong at Brookfield - which is what we've been saying since this unbelievable plot first surfaced. No surprise, only surprise is that Ruth is surprised. Not even any attempt to make the Heatherpet excuse a valid one - how often has anyone actually been to see her since she had her accident (and actually needed help)? Just a huge storm in a teacup to drive a wedge between Daveed and his siblings, Daveed and Rooth, Rooth and Jill etc etc. I don't for a single moment believe the bypass will go ahead either - no one can be bothered to follow it through in real time so it will no doubt be seen off before the end of summer and we'll all have to live with the dramatic fall out - potentially entertaining though it might be - knowing it is all entirely contrived (cue DH telling me it's all contrived because it's not real you know!)

Every word of that seconded, Lillian! (Right down to your husband's reaction!)

I never believed they would move, so there has been no dramatic tension in any of this for me. Misconceived from the start and made much worse by muddling up two reasons for the move. They should have picked one and gone with that, and tried to make the timescales a bit more realistic. A slow burn story about years and years of planning blight would have worked better.

I find Ruth very tiresome. It's got a lot to do with the acting and the ludicrously overdone accent, but I just don't warm to the character at all. She can be so strident at times and it's not relieved by anything else. Lynda is also very strident but she can be extremely amusing (inadvertently) and I have also often felt great poignancy in some of her scenes. Her relationship with Robert feels believable and natural, for example, and her sadness about never having children came through with just a few lines of dialogue but so well acted. I'm afraid FF is not an accomplished actress and it has often showed. If Ruth leaves, I for one will be delighted. She can take Pip with her.

Best bit for me last night was Hayley revealing that she is going to train as a teacher. Go Hayley! It probably comes of leaving the village, though. Once out of the forcefield her mind was able to clear and she could see at last that her life didn't have to be limited to a mindnumbingly dull non-job within a mile of home. Alice should get out while she can. Let's hope Phoebe can also escape.

Agree about tension. It was all about tediously waiting for the inevitable

Maybe Hayley will start up a free school in the village. Probably in about six months when she is a fully qualified teacher having done a one day course

How is Ruth a first class sow??? I don't really like her but honestly I would go absolutely apeshit in her position. I thought her reaction was acted really well - as if she was bursting with rage.

oh yes, i agree taht last night's episode, while realistic in the current situation (IMO), in no way justify the means to get there or to the ongoing dramatic fallout

i agree that the scene with hayley and pheobe was fab. rooting for those two definitely

I'm not really a Ruth hater either (though I can't stand Pip - in either incarnation). I'm not sure about her reaction. My feeling is she knows David well enough to not be surprised at his about turn. The signs have been there and I think she would have been aware of them - there would have been more Are you sure you're ok with this? You're not getting cold feet? She also knows Daveed's relationship with his mum and how much the farm means to Jill. It was her idea for Jill to move in with them, they've always had a good relationship. The I might have known you'd be behind this kind of reaction doesn't ring true. I thought she'd be more Did you see this coming? I don't think she's behaving in character though I can see how Pip might throw her toys out of the pram over the volte face. None of this story has been in character though so perhaps accepting that everyone has acted entirely out of character in this charade maybe she is NBU!! (I think I'm going to be feeling this way about a lot of the fall out for the farm sale collapse).

so we are led to believe that davids darling mummy could see him crumbling over the decision but his wife just erupts with fury at him. Sure I would be angry with him but honestly - she must be completely self absorbed to either
a) not noticed davids decent into madness
or b) had an inkling that this decision may be a teeny weeny bit hard for him

I know this was all plot device anyway so can't take much of the outcomes too seriously, but I would say Ruths behaviour over the whole thing ('there's noooo other way') and David not feeling he can talk to her show more cracks in the marriage then falling out over the sale in itself will cause (which I assume s not the sw intention but a side effect of the way it is plotted - which again brings me to my main complaint that they prioritise plot over character)

xpost lillian! agree! plot over character yet again

Fabulous crosspost BYOS!