Thread #106: Jim’s in a jam, Peggy’s made a pickle and Lexi is blooming - sounds like the entries are lining up for this year’s flower and produce show, but who will be on the organising committee?

[Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g]

Thank you, @PseudoBadger, for kicking off this long, long series of Archers threads and @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 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!

For newer listeners, lurkers or those who just have no idea what we're talking about, DadDadDad has created this useful thread: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/radio_addicts/3557323-For-Archers-fans-a-guide-to-acronyms-on-the-long-running-discussion-threads-and-any-other-meta-thread-questions-you-may-have BOOP point for him! (See thread for explanation.)

Thanks to LillianGish for the title of this thread.

Holding episode tonight, I thought - not much progress on any current storyline. I was a touch surprised Natasha wasn't offended by the postnup idea but I suspect she's biding her time.

I also think that A and F are behaving realistically. This doesn't just affect Jim. Both A and F will be re-evaluating their childhoods and relationship with their father in light of what they have learned. Their whole sense of who they are - the children of a somewhat distant father - will change. I.e. a shift from "our father was undemonstrative" to "our father was unable to be demonstrative".

I loved Jim’s day out and the fragmented reminiscing (reminded me ever so slightly of Krapp’s Last Tape) If anything good has come out of all this it is that it has brought them back together as a family - Fiona has been so entirely absent (not even mentioned) and yet she and Alistair have a warm and close relationship. And they all had wonderful memories of their mum. It made me a bit sad that they had missed out on more days out like this over the years. I love Leonard too - another excellent addition. And what a welcome relief from the tedious Peggy charitable trust story - I wish there was some way of just knocking all that on the head.

I loved Jim’s day out and the fragmented reminiscing
I didn't. When I first started listening to TA I liked it, in preference to other soaps, because it seemed more realistic. Either it has changed or I have.
The conversation about when they last visited the Birthplace was all wrong. In this neck of the woods it's one of the places to take visitors. The conversation just reminded me that Ambridge life is weird - they rarely have people from outside the village nor escape Ambridge themselves ; nobody has visiting friends or distant relatives. It's taken Fiona more than a decade to come to visit her father and brother!
And I can't believe that Al hasn't been to Stratford since he was 11. Did he and Shula never take Daniel there? Have they never been to the RSC?

It's all too much like Drama and not enough like an everyday story of country folk.

Well Alistair and Fiona didn't grow up round there so it would have been a one-off visit on a holiday when their mum was alive. I suppose he and Shula might have taken Daniel - or Daniel might have gone on a school trip. Shula's always been very rooted in Ambridge - horses, hunting farming, church rather than cultural visits. She's certainly not a theatre buff and nor is Alistair. They don't have lots of visiting friends and family to show round do they? I thought it was a realistic approximation of what can we do? Where can we go so Dad can think about something else? A family day out - to a place where people do go for family days out.

I speak from experience, re the way A & F are behaving. It explained why we didn't have a relationship with one of my grandfathers, and I never badgered my parent about it.

I had more emotional maturity at 15, than they do at their ages.

I'd forgotten the bit with Leonard. I laughed at the way he spoke to the traffic warden, and thought he'd never get away with it, but as it wasn't mentioned that he got a ticket, I guess he must have done.

And I can't believe that Al hasn't been to Stratford since he was 11. Did he and Shula never take Daniel there? Have they never been to the RSC?

It was odd. Has anyone in Ambridge (other than Lynda) ever mentioned Shakespeare? I’m not sure that a single one of them, in my half century of listening, has ever attended a contemporary play anywhere ... (Calendar Girls does not count!)

Oh, and re visiting Stratford, I brought my children up in London, and there were lots of tourist places I didn't take my children to. They often went on school trips to those places, so I can well believe that Alistair hadn't been back there.

Why on earth would they go to Stratford? It's not in Borsetshire.
They havr LL for all things Olde Worlde, Bert for poetry and Lynda for playwriting.

I've only ever spent one afternoon in Stratford and I'm in my 40s - and we always holidayed in Britain. Seems very possible Alistair hasn't been there since he was 11.

I've only been to Stratford-upon-Avon once and that was when we got cheap tickets for the theatre when I was a student, I think. I can't remember what we saw, or much about the place itself, mind, as it was about 40 years ago. I have at least two (separate) friends who go regularly, from London, though. Coincidentally, both listeners to "The Archers".

Why on earth would they go to Stratford? It's not in Borsetshire. I agree. The problem is where fiction meets reality. Borsetshire is not a real place - and yet it is in England and somewhere in the Midlands. So although if it were really part of say Warwickshire/Worcestershire itwould be bang next Stratford, the fact that Ambridge is entirely surrounded by Borsetshire before it touches on these other real places puts Stratford much further away than it would be in real life IYSWIM (I'm not entirely do I myself). It is surprising that Lynda does not go to Stratford more often, but once reality starts to impinge then Borsertshire starts to lose its point.

once reality starts to impinge then Borsertshire starts to lose its point.

Fabulous essay question! If only I were not so hot and lethargic right now. 😎

But people go to Birmingham, Canada etc. although we don't usually hear it "live".

Stratford can't be all that far from Ambridge.

This may have been said, but just dropping in to say, driving tests don't have hill starts anymore!

Ha ha no way Saker that’s hilarious! Somebody tweet Keri Davies!

They haven't had hill starts for years, have they? I don't remember if I had to learn them for my tests in the early '90s. I have done them plenty of times. I just don't remember them as part of the test. It's possible I have just blocked the trauma, though!

@Ebearhug I took my test in 1991 and had to do a hill start.

I don't remember doing a hill start for my test in the early eighties. I did have to do an emergency stop.

Was it that there was a list of things you might have to do, so you practised them all and on the day, the test instructor actually asked you to do only some of them?

(It's not as if there were no hills where I lived; the place is built in a river valley and has hills in all directions from it.)

But the government seems to think you do have to: www.gov.uk/driving-test/what-happens-during-test

"Pulling over at the side of the road

You’ll be asked to pull over and pull away during your test, including:

normal stops at the side of the road
pulling out from behind a parked vehicle
a hill start

You might also be asked to carry out an emergency stop."

I finally passed Easter 1991, and I remember that for the next lot of tests after Easter, they introduced parallel parking - I was just relieved I didn't have to learn another manoeuvre! I wonder if hill starts came in with those changes. (I now live in a fairly narrow road and can parallel park like a pro!)

But there were jokes about hill-starts in the Fens in the 1960s, so they must have been part of it then. The jokes were mostly about how far you'd have to go before you could take your test if you had to find a hill...

Well maybe I'm wrong, my Ds1 did his driving test in Jan 2018 and the syllabus had just changed. The emphasis was more on driving independently with sat nav etc than manoeuvres. I didn't think that starting on a hill was a specific requirement that you get tested on. But then we live in the Fens (In my day it was hill start, 3 point turn and reversing round a corner).

The jokes were mostly about how far you'd have to go before you could take your test if you had to find a hill.

I was wondering how they did them in Lincolnshire.

I asked Ds1 and he said no he didn't have to do one or practise specifically for one. In my day (late 1980s) it was definitely more like it was presented for Ben - where it was a specific manoeuvre you had to do along with a 3 point turn and reversing round a corner. Now, I think you may be asked to as part of the general driving, but it's not a named component. So maybe Ds1 didn't get asked because there are no hills in Cambridge! But I don't get the impression it's the big deal now that it was made out to be in the programme.

I passed in 1979 and think I had to do a hill start. Also 3 point turn, reversing round a corner, and emergency stop (which was always included).

One of my school friends took her test about the same time. In those days the instructor gave you one last hour-long lesson. My friend practised her emergency stop, and a woman came rushing out because of the squeal of brakes. During the test, the emergency stop came in the same place, and the same woman rushed out

When I passed my test, in 1992, at my third try in 18 years, I was prepared for a test with two out of three of a hill start, a three-point turn and parallel parking. Am still grateful I wasn't asked to parallel park!