#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?

Therapy for all the family then - probably wouldn’t have made very interesting listening though. I’m already a bit bored with Elizabeth’s.

The burning question me is whether JOHN himself would necessarily stuck with the pigs himself decade after decade.
Absolutely this. Pat wants it all preserved in aspic.

What has happened to Lizzie's therapy? The SW went to the bother of finding an actor to play the part so I assumed that we'd hear a bit more.

I think its out of character for Tom to dump the pigs. It's the heart of his business, and has survived many iterations of his entrepeneurship. It's like dumping the integrity of the brand.

The point is we know Pat is right about Natasha because we have been privy to her conversations with Tom that have brought him to this point. We know Natasha is pulling the strings and when he says "We think..." what he really means is "Natasha thinks..." Pat suspects this, Tony wants to give her the benefit of the doubt, but we know Pat is right - whatever we may think of her. She wants Tom to be OK - it's the biting-your-tongue agony of any parent whose child takes up with someone they perceive to be a bad'un. Now she thinks Natasha is encouraging Tom to make bad decisions regarding the family business she can't bite her tongue any longer. Pat's far from perfect, but her instincts are right on this occasion.

Pat's instincts may be right (for once) but she's going about it in totally the wrong way (as per usual).

I don't think we can blame Natasha for Tom's business decisions, he lurched from one scheme to another long before her arrival. Tom may be giving up the pigs because of her influence but it could just as easily be because he read an article about the benefits of farming alpacas. He has the attention span of a 3 year old.

Pat's instincts may be right (for once) but she's going about it in totally the wrong way (as per usual). Spot on.

Gosh, Will was a little wild there ...

Poor Ruairi ...

Hah! Tom & Natasha won’t last til Christmas. (Hopefully ...)

Tom totally told Natasha about John and the pigs

He gave an overview of the bare facts. Her complaint was that he didn't mention all the emotional overtones involved. To be fair, Tom probably didn't mention them because he can be less emotionally aware than the average Ambridge resident, and that's a low bar.

Basically Tom and Nasha are blaming each other for getting married before they had time to get to know each other properly.

But if your new husband tells you they took over their dead brother’s small family-based business how could you possibly not understand that that might be emotionally significant for his mother?

Well Tom didn't understand the significance and John was his brother.

@Motoko surely all of the work with pigs is "grunt work"

TNT will last past Christmas.

The 🔮 sees a girl-child...

And incidentally, when was the last time someone milked those poor neglected goats?

Yes, they seem to have been totally forgotten about. I hope the poor things haven't quietly starved to death because the entire family has erased them from their collective consciousness.

I think we will see fireworks from Jazzer! Maybe Toby will give him a job on his new whey fermeter and distillery, I would think Jazzer might be quite keen on that. I am now resigned to the fact that the SWs will ignore that this is technically difficult and I'm sure he will have it up and running within a week of Helen giving him a bucket of whey.
(This is also an experiment because the last six threads I have commented on have been killed by me, if I kill this one I know its a sign to leave MN...or do some work).

This is an Archers thread chemenger. They never die.

So, who feels sorry for Freddie?

Tom saying ‘oh we can just buy the pork in’ is just a rehash of Bridge farm getting rid of the cows and buying the milk for the cheese in surely? And look how well that turned out!

Tom is such an idiot. What a way to talk to poor (and lovely) Jazzer.

Glad to see that Jazzer has the measure of Nasher as well as Pat.

Much as I love Freddie, he brought it on himself.
Good old Jazzer.
I like Ruairi too. He's turned out all right.

Freddie had no right to say Fallon 'owed him', I wouldn't have given him a job after that. And what her father did is not her responsibility.

Freddie is such an arse. Well done Kenton and Fallon.

I can’t believe that a nearly 40 year old business man approached Jazzer like that. It was appalling.