SOC has soaked Ambridge to the core across a never ending weekend. Discuss The Archers post-watershed here.

[PseudoBadger]

Deluged damp squid or not? And has Peggy been assisted off the mortal coil by Rob yet?
And when will JD and Brian remember Debbie?

Nope. The point was that it would mean Ruth, David and Pip could each get on with big important things ...

It will all be fine ...

Dear me. RoboPip and RoboRuth cannot be gainsaid, can they?

(Oh - I didn't answer your query about Dawn Summers.

Was very strange. I did watch regularly at the time and Dawn just appeared in the story as Buffy's sister - when she'd had no sister before. And everyone accepted her unquestioningly. But some benign superpowers had transformed The Key into a girl who would be protected by the Slayer. Buffy died to save her and Willow brought Buffy back to life.)

Fortunately we still have local shops where I live, but it's Morrisons for basics and Waitrose for treats.

I did wonder how Josh would cope with escorting Heatherpet to the Ladies in the Motorway Service stations.[sceptical]

Other than the above-mentioned issue about helping frail Granny to the loo, I think it's entirely fine that Josh is going to get HP and indeed I was pleased that they suggested he go - he's a farm boy who will have been driving vehicles on the land since he was younger than 17, he doesn't have a record of acting like an idiot, he'll know the way from previous drives with his parents and he's probably already taken himself off to the motorway to Birmingham just to practice (I know that the motorway was the first place I headed when I passed my test - it was like the final frontier).

Rural kids don't make such a big deal of driving because they have to rely on cars to get around - they just get on with it.

It's not a plot lie in itself, it's just, as was said above, to free up Ruth for the meeting and get HP to Ambridge without posters ( like icmoi ) accusing the SWs of giving HP a miracle recovery

So we were going to move the whole family to HH because of dear old frail granny who keeps falling over and fracturing bits of herself ... but decided that it would be a better idea to get her down here for Easter where the world is freshly covered in slippy floody-mud?
Yeah, that makes sense.

And I wouldn't ask a teenager who had recently passed his test to do that trip. Not fair on him nor granny.

Does Tony have to be quite so moany? Assuming from an interview that they're going to be prosecuted and convicted is one hell of a stretch, and doesn't help anyone anyway.

Do we really think JD is going to let Kate loose in the kitchen all weekend? I'm wondering if it's an early April Fool on her part and she will produce that haunch of venison after all. If not, I suspect the whole family will be decamping to Grey Gables.

My first long drive after I passed my test was almost exactly the reverse of the same route that Josh is doing! Although my destination was a suburb of Birmingham.. I'm a bit sketchy about where Ambridge actually "is".

Spaghetti junction was slightly terrifying, mind.

HP is lucky it's Josh driving and not me at least he won't be bellowing along to his Cher tapes for 4 hours and I am sure they will be fine.

while i enjoyed the scene of jenny telling brian that kate would be doing easter catering, i do feel rather sorry for vegans that kate is yet another stereotype of the high-needs and high-drama faddy vegan, whereas the couple of vegans i know are very normal and keen that their food requirements don't put an unfair cost or time burden on others, and they don't go around evangelising either. i know the whole thing fits in with kate's personality and is in character, but it is a bit of a cliché all the same

When DD passed her test she had taken time off school for it and I was prepared for the request to take the car to school after it.
She dropped me at home then off she went.
Somehow she clocked 80 miles on a trip to school and back! (I think I did the same at that age.)

Chopper a cliché in TA? Who'd'a thunk it?

Meant to add a

Rural kids don't make such a big deal of driving because they have to rely on cars to get around - they just get on with it.

Except for those of us who didn't, and took 4 attempts to pass.

i do feel rather sorry for vegans that kate is yet another stereotype of the high-needs and high-drama faddy vegan

It is very Kate, though. I think one reason it's a stereotype is because you're far less likely to hear from the ones who just get on with it.

And Tony's always been moany, too.

Idly ponders what's in a vegan quiche.

The idea that Rauri (well, Brine really, obv) couldn't manage to subsist on vegan food for one weekend is a bit odd really. There's always beans on toast! Though I suppose Easter on a farm you really would expect a nice tender lamb to the slaughter.

Should be fun to hear Kate pontificating about how to make Home Farm more ecologically sound or whatever it was she thinks she'll be more qualified to do than Adam by the end of her course. Fortunately he knows how to deal with her pretty well.

I think you get 2 kinds of vegan. Actual vegans and look at my I'm a vegan....this weeks. Kate is very like the fad vegans I have met.
whereas my parents were convinced my vegetarianism was a phase. 21 years later...long phase.
and yy I would have driven that distance at that age having come from a rural area. Although spaghetti junction is a bit daunting.

Where's Ambridge supposed to be? From somewhere south-ish of Brum wouldn't you get to the M42 then head north-east towards M1 then A1 so you wouldn't use spaghetti junction. (Not that it's difficult if you're going through on M6 or from M5 and you avoid rush times).

My first journey after passing my test was a slightly shorter but similar trip in the brand-new Nissan micra bought in middlesbrough to where I worked in Oxford - though I was a bit older than Josh.

I'd expect he'd use M42, then A42 then M1, then A1. :)

It's based roughly on Hanbury in Worcestershire, isn't it, while nicking other suitable bits of other villages in the area, like Inkberrow, so it's not an exact copy or anything, just a rough idea. Have never been there, so no idea whether it would upset the pictures in my head.

Oh, we haven't had a Grundy tomfoollery episode for yonks!

It was a teeny bit of a delight. Three generations of Grundy men finding their way into but not out of a scrape ... The nice thing was that they each behaved as themselves so the comedy felt intrinsic rather than imposed. (Ok, so it's a slow evening here ...)

Probably deserves a BOOP.

Ambridge is based on Hanbury, though I'm not quite sure why because Hanbury isn't really a village - it's random houses scattered about. The local church and Big House are the models for St Stephens and LL.
It's a beautiful part of the world as celebrated by our local sleb, the poet A E. Housman (Shropshire Lad). The other local(ish) sleb is Elgar. The pictures in your head are right Ebear.

I don't suppose there was a coded message in Eddie beating a sock to death, was there?

I do live in Borcetshire. I wonder if I'm related?