If The Archers characters were acted by dogs, Rob would be a Shih Tzu. Discuss Ambridge events here.

[PseudoBadger]

Avoided a non-sweary title.

NBS is back on form. I love "Rob could be crouching and lurking in the wings. No one thinks he has gone quietly or, indeed, gone at all. Is he disguised as a bush, Dad’s Army style?"

Harrumph at the SW and their business acumen, or lack of. You do not buy big equipment on the overdraft, you get a long-term loan.
Alistair really is a soft touch (as his clients and Matt know).

Ruth tonight. What a cow. Clearly nothing's more terrifying to her than the prospect of Jill being proved right. Grrrr.

yes please Francis. A good reason to live!

Ruth will be no use to anyone wrt household chores so I suspect she will be locked in the cereal cupboard

CA obviously shares our views on Pip. I enjoyed both the reference to David and Ruth's little Princess at the beginning, and the penny finally dropping for her at the end.

Whenever we hear Shula in the vicinity of a horse she seems to be struggling to control it. She doesn't seem much good at her job at all.

The horse is probably spooked by the sound of those coconuts.

And can I just add that I'm well hacked off with Lillian. A bit of decorum if you please.

But how on earth would we know a horse was there unless it was wildly out of control?

Yes Lillian gloating about her affair was a bit grim.

You must admit that an entirely silent horse is bad radio

I like Anisha's emphasis on getting paid for work done. And building the practice is probably the midlife shot in the arm that poor, bored-out-of-his-mind Alisdair needs.

You don't love him, you twerp. And your feelings are not a good guide. Your mother is also a twerp. Christ, I hate them all! Why are they so stupid?

Who thinks they love who?

Pip! saying she 'loves Tobee'. And then Ruth saying, 'listen to your feelings'" No, no, no, to both. Pip is simply hot-knickered for Toby, and twisted up with pride, stubborness and now fear for her £5k and looking a fool.

Didn't she love Jude and spencer and Matthew As well?

Listening to Pip's feelings is a singularly useless thing to do if they tell her she loves Towbee but he's buggered off.

Where does Ruth get off agreeing that she won't tell David about the money? It's only just over a year since she was constantly getting pissed off about David and Pip conspiring together not to tell her what was going on.

Ruth has never been one of my favourites but after tonight's episode she is at the top of my hit list! The way she spoke about Jill was awful. No wonder Pip is the way she is.

I hope that some of us are having a re-think about poor old Jill's position in light of tonight's evidence of Ruth's dismissal of her opinion .

Sounds like a ghastly episode. Perhaps Ruth will sub Pip from grannie Heathers legacy. She never used to to be so vile to Jill. Or an I remembering alternative facts.

Pip's accent is terrible. Quite posh then she suddenly says "meat bawls". Intonation weird as well. There's often a suppressed whinge in her voice.

Ruth was awful too and in tonight's ep slightly out of character, I thought. Just as Jill has been seriously out of character during the whole Toby thing. The boring Grace refs! As if a new SW has just been reading an old Archers annual or something.

The Anisha thing is also v annoying. V implausible that she'd be demanding a huge overdraft at this stage. Surely while negotiating, or further down the line once she'd established herself?

Also -- Alistair's business goes belly up, and so does Shula's tenure as Chief Honcho of the Hunt. YAWN.

Agree that the Partnership discussions are ridiculous. A Partnership is like a marriage: things like attitudes to money are key areas of (dis)agreement. And it's hardly surprising that Alistair with the Stables and whatever commitments he has would have a different attitude to money compared with young, free and single, live for the job Anisha. But as others have said this should have been discussed way before the Partnership Agreement was signed. (Assuming they have one of course - could be interesting if it all goes pear-shaped and they are only a Partnership at will I.e. not worth the paper it (isn't) written on).

Do vet practices not have practice managers? Coming from a GP point of view we couldn't in any way cope without our PM. Obviously vets don't have to deal with all the Governmental bullshit paperwork that we do but it seems very old-fashioned to have Alistair chasing his own invoices - a bit like All Creatures Great and Small. Maybe it's because he's been a single-hander? I guess larger, group practices must have administrative support. Anyway. I would think it would be worth the outlay on a PM or at least an Office Assistant to get the invoices paid on time and also free Alistair/Anisha up to see more clients instead of doing paperwork. Certainly if they're 'extending the overdraft' by 250k!?

I fear that we're about to discover how little the SWs know about Partnerships (as well as riding, horses etc etc as infinitum)