#102: Fatted calf is off the menu - will the Easter Bunny save Lower Loxley's bacon, or will there be egg on Russ's face? Will Tom's sausage business get the chop? Join us here to discuss The Archers!

[GabrielleNelson]

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. Thanks also to all those who contributed to the thread title, principally Dumdedumdedum and MikeUniformMike on this occasion.

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 this thread, where spoilers are positively welcomed!

So, to business: will Helen's new cheese be a success? Will Kate succeed in keeping her visiting Brummies under control? Will Pip, Toby, Tom and Natasha fall into the slurry pit, leaving Rosie to be brought up by Anthony Head Robin Fairbrother? Will we ever hear Lee again, and will he casually drop in a mention of his fine collection of framed Bruce Lee posters?

Re sausage boy can someone explain who makes the sausages
Maurice He is so miserable that he makes Alexi Sayle sound cheerful.

I wonder if part of Natasha's irritation about village/family intrusion is that her whole act is based on smoke & mirrors - it doesn't suit her to have people knowing too much reality.

Yes Maurice thanks R4 I knew his name ended in 'ice' something like Lewis, another silent character.

True about Tash's irritation, but wouldn't the Nuffield people have done research into her 'business' ?

I thought I heard Natasha refer to Trevor as her "partner" at one point, I suspect he is the main owner of the business.

Oooooh I didn't hear that. Choccy Tom would go ape if he knew.

Interesting theory, Choccy. There must be other people involved because Natasha only does sales and marketing but somebody must organise the fruit farming, production, quality control, packaging, distribution, accounting & admin, etc, etc

Just done my Saturday morning catch up. After Peggy's grilling, the drop everything and answer the family summons twice and the ridiculous honeymoon booking I'm actually starting to feel a bit sorry for Natasha.

I'm wondering if rather than there being anything really sinister about Natasha the SWs are actually using her as a vehicle to get the Bridge Farm Archers to hold a mirror up to themselves (long overdue in my opinion).

Ha, R4, you've got me picturing Alexei Sayle as Tom's sausage-maker grumbling away as he works:

"Those incarcerated animals in the farmyard out there stand as a microcosm of the world's natural resources: to be stripped from snout to tail by a remorseless capitalist imperative and so be commodified into a uniform package. All so that the bourgeoisie can demonstrate their superiority to the proletariat scum by their virtue-signalling consumption of products labelled 'organic'. Organic?! What an Orwellian adjective! As if the rest of us are machines fit only to consume inorganic matter manufactured in a chemical vat!

"And talking of Orwell, the real pigs are not in the farmyard, they're in the farmhouse, our oppressors..."

There must be other people involved because Natasha only does sales and marketing but somebody must organise the fruit farming, production, quality control, packaging, distribution, accounting & admin, etc, etc

Well quite but Fruit Juice Girl's business empire is even more unbelievable than Sausage Boy's.

Maurice does utter occasionally. He's a part-time silent

Iirc he's quite the philosopher when he's allowed to speak. Or maybe he just ponders for long periods of silence then produces a perfectly-crafted nugget of wisdom.

Hmmm, so maybe Natasha is basically the salesperson then? The public face of the business, hence her preoccupation with appearances....

Could Natasha divorce Tom and totally rinse him (and the family business) financially?

The drop everything lunch and tea things was a bit bizarre. The week after the wedding, maybe. But not 3 weeks later. It’s just more evidence of Tom being an idiot-accepting invitations without checking.

Courts tend to put both parties in the situation they were in before marriage, if the marriage is still quite new (under 2 years, I think), so it's unlikely Natasha could rinse him.

Isn't Maurice the Sausagemaker also Alistair's GA sponsor?
(Loved the Alexei Sayle riff there, DDD )

Could Natasha divorce Tom and totally rinse him (and the family business) financially?

Not in real life. As Motoko says the courts would look to have the parties put in the position they were in before.

The farm is not matrimonial property (in Scotland because (a) Tom and the others owned it before the marriage so it isn't matrimonial property. "Matrimonial property" is different I think in England but Tom isn't the sole owner of the farm)

Fruit Juice Girl still has the fruit juice empire, Sausage Boy has his business.

There is of course the implausible bank loan they took out to develop the vegetable box app but they would be responsible for that.

I loved Jim’s ‘reframing’ of Jazzer’s work style but fear it may backfire.

Totally agree that a honeymoon 10 miles away is a joke!

I think Natasha is probably okay actually
She married Tom in the rebound and if you think back to whats gone wrong, it is pretty much all Toms fault. It was not Natasha that wanted Tony and Pat in a little bungalow, for example.
She just does not fit in to the family and village - but she has tried. Meeting with Peggy, doing the makeovers, buying nice gifts. The woman has tried.....

Tom just has his head firmly up his bum imo 😁

I still don't see what is so wrong with a honeymoon near home.

What is wrong , for example, about going to a luxury hotel like Stobo Castle or The Ritz just because you live in the Scottish Borders or London ?You're not spending (wasting) money and time on travel. Tom's actual choice wasn't something like Stobo or The Ritz and sounds rubbish but I don't see why a honeymoon is only a honeymoon if it involves a massive travel carbon footprint.

it is pretty much all Toms fault It really isn't.

Why are we only hearing from dull characters at the moment? Where is Lynda? Brian and Jenny? Lillian? Nobody wants to listen to Shula droning on in a bible quotation match with Alan or another over dramatic fight from the most unlikely couple in fiction. Where has the light relief gone? Jazzer’s CV was fun but even it came with a big moaning session from Jim. Ambridge has become a miserable place.

I don't see why a honeymoon is only a honeymoon if it involves a massive travel carbon footprint. Now that weddings and honeymoons tend to happen after the couple have lived together for a while, there isn't the same imperative to spend the entire time in bed. So a honeymoon 6 miles away means you're doing the same things together as you do in normal life.

I've had holidays only 1.5 hours from home, but there are limits!

It's nice to explore other areas. You could drive 2 or 3 hours, and end up in an area with completely different scenery, and interesting places to visit.

If you're only down the road, nowhere will be new to you.

We regularly holiday somewhere that’s just over an hour’s drive away. However it’s a seaside village with lots of stuff to do, completely different from where we live with beautiful cottages. Not a “lodge” in the same county when you already spend a lot of time in the countryside on a farm. I think I would prefer a weekend at Grey Gables with some lovely food and pampering to a log cabin in April.

I don't think it's about the carbon footprint. I think Natasha is feeling utterly overwhelmed by Ambridge and the Archers clan.
She doesn't strike me as a lodge type anyway. Can you imagine the crushing disappointment? I've booked us a honeymoon No passport needed. Oh okay. It's a hut in the woods a few miles down the road.
!@$%!

After her conversation with Peggy re babies you can't blame her for feeling like Ambridge is taking over her inside and out. It must also really hit home that Tom does not know her at all.

A local honeymoon should be a joint decision. It wouldn't boher me but it's an awful surprise.

It just shows how little Tom knows her. Us listeners know her well enough to know that she'd be wanting a boutique hotel, somewhere warm and sunny, where she can lay on the beach or by the pool, sipping cocktails, and with spa facilities on site, so she can have relaxing massages and facials.

Natasha mentioned Scotland or Northern Ireland. She would have been fine with that.