Thread 98 - Discuss The Archers here! If you don’t give a ha’porthfor Pip come and add your two penn’orth - we do enjoy a bit of change counting (especially if it’s in old money)

[Bittermints]

Many thanks to @LilianGish for the title (again - she has real gift for this!). Further thanks due to @PseudoBadger for kicking off this long, long series of Archers threads and to @DadDadDad for being our resident statistician and keeping the ball rolling when Pseudo stepped back a bit.

All views on The Archers welcome here! New blood welcomed. We don't all agree on all points and most of us are posting tongue in cheek a lot of the time, so don't worry about revealing that you'd like to be Susan's best friend or other odd unusual views.

Spoilers: not on this thread, please. We don't wait for the omnibus to discuss the weeknight episodes, but we do try our best to avoid cross-contamination from www.mumsnet.com/Talk/radio_addicts/3439443-keep-it-to-yourself-the-archers-spoilers-thread-4, where spoilers are positively welcomed!

(Change counting references arose specifically out of a nostalgic discussion on the previous thread, if anyone is intrigued.)

Yes I thought that was great too!

Why has Adam forgotten that he voted for Brexit? He doesn't get to complain about any airport chaos - or when Lexi is barred from entering the country in future.

Somehow I don't think there is a power on earth that can stop Adam complaining. He'd have blank scripts otherwise.

David is just too much for me, oh my god he is is such a weirdo.

He needs therapy and eventually when that doesn't work a padded cell

Leonard needs to watch his back, David has too much form for 'accidents'

BOOP for the goodbye scene between Roy and Lexi, and the following scene with Kirsty. They could have overdone it but kept it restrained. Really good writing and acting.

Found Elizabeth saying 'I think I might have depression' really odd like it's something one might catch!

Got to love Jolene for being patiently persistent with her

Found Elizabeth saying 'I think I might have depression' really odd like it's something one might catch!
I thought that sounded odd too but her breakdown and crying was heart rending, very well acted.

We’ve done wife-beating. Now we’re doing depression. Christ.

I was expecting her to say ‘I think I’m having a breakdown’.

Also agree that Elizabeth's weeping and account of her inability to cope very convincing, really well done, but the "I have depression" doesn't convince. I'm being snobbish here: Elizabeth wouldn't express herself that ill-informed way, as if it was contagious, in the manner of people who "catch AIDS". Far better for the ep to have ended with her saying 'breaking down/having a breakdown" and leave the diagnosis for next week.

OMFG, my son is 17, fully cognisant social and sexual wise, like, and loves, just loves,not only his fleecy pjs, but also his sheepskin slippers, his cashmere bedsocks and his goose-down pillows, duvet and fleece throws. HIs slender girlfriend wears his old pjs when she stays over.

PJs rock, and not just for the over 50s. Toby not owning any (I think he does own them) doesn't mean he's a lurve god. Just that he doesn't cover the basics of self-care (more likely).

I realise this is MN and the language can be strong at times, not a problem; but I would really prefer it if people didn’t use religious words as swearing, if possible, please. I know I’m only one poster and I don’t have any kind of right not to be offended, so I’m just putting it out there as a request.

Back to TA, I wonder if the nascent agoraphobia is going to develop with Lizzie, or if the SW are happy now that it’s just ‘generic’ depression and thus they can load her up with any number of symptoms as the plot requires. I fear the latter. It’s a shame; I feel that agoraphobia in conjunction with depression could have been a good bit of public service broadcasting.

I have depression. The first time I had it, it really was quite confusing- because you know what it is, see it in others but can’t see it in yourself. Saying it out loud is a very strange experience and is as if you’ve never heard the word before and you’ve contracted some rare tropical disease.

still - I am about to go to bed, but wanted to let you know that I appreciate you sharing your experience. I’m sorry depression has come into your life - I hope you are contact with people who are helping you to address it. What have you made of Lizzie’s storyline?

Saying it out loud is a very strange experience and is as if you’ve never heard the word before and you’ve contracted some rare tropical disease

Good point, and one I hadn't considered.

I agree with you Fink . This has always been a really friendly thread, so swearing feels a bit out of place.
That is interesting about your son Cromer - maybe the trend for PJs / non PJs has gone full circle.

stillearning

Can this please be a thread where the MN guidelines are sufficient, and no special pleading needed?

If you don't like the language, better to take it up with poster directly, rather than passive aggressive comments. And yes, I mean cheminotte and Fink.

Saying it out loud is a very strange experience and is as if you’ve never heard the word before

Did you say it out loud at that stage though? I think Elizabeth is one of the best actors in the show by a long chalk but that particular line of the script really jarred with me.

I've only heard someone with depression say it out loud after actually being in treatment for some time. It may be more normal than I've witnessed but it just felt a very forced statement at that point.

I don't recall Rickyard being derelict

I don't think it ever was. It was a farmworker's cottage decades ago which went the way of all tied cottages when farmworkers were moved to be "self employed" back in the 80s. Many of that type of cottage became additional income for the farm as rentals/holiday cottages. Jill used to run Rickyard in that way.

Ed'n'Emmur lived in it for a while but then GoldenPoppet needed her personal for the ever expanding ego.
It only became a holiday cottage again to partially recover the costs of Pip's cock up with the cows (which then became some sort of holy act of self sacrifice meriting yet more subservience from all around her).

She has been (reasonably subtly) portrayed as highly sexed

Do you think so? She has been portrayed as having an actual sex life but nothing more than a young person having a sex life and always within some form of relationship.

Tracey Horobin is the only woman on TA I can think of as portrayed as overtly sexual and presumably having recreational sex outside a relationship - and of course its portrayed as a negative. A number of the male characters have been portrayed over the years as wannabe shagfesters.

David came across as thick and boorish

^This. Also downright rude and discourteous to a guest. How dare Jill have the potential for some kind of life which doesn't centre David!

Honestly David is a patronising neanderthal a lot of the time but he really excelled himself with Leonard.

stillearning

It jarred with me too - although I can kind see Elizabeth conceptualising it as a thing she has contracted as possibly easier than to bear rather than thinking of it as an understandable personal response to the events of recent months.

echt I'd actually like to comment Finks lack of passive-aggressiveness - she made a very straightforward and polite request, which I don't feel inclined to comply with, but I have no issue with her asking!

cheminotte, interesting - I find swearing in this context friendly rather than unfriendly!

commend, not comment!

I'd add that I don't think fink's request was passive-aggressive. She asked politely. Personally, I too would prefer that posters don't use reference to God or Christ as swearwords, but I accept I'm probably not going to get anywhere by asking (so, well done, fink, for at least asking).