Discuss The Archers #107: Beware of the Dragon! Peggy's in her den awaiting bids - who gets the hoard and who gets flamed?

[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 @MrsGrindah for inspiration for the title of this thread. I was hoping to find a way to combine it with @C8H10N4O2's inspired suggestion of '"The Assumption of the Ambridge Angel' and @chemenger's comment 'I hope she gets kicked in the head by a horse and wakes up an atheist', but it all got a bit too lengthy.

Odds on Joe shuffling off this mortal coil before this thread ends? We've been marking/anticipating his passing for a while now.

Thanks GaspOde for the new thread. I don't know how you folks come up with the titles!!

Pat making sufficient soup at night so as to have enough to serve as breakfast, is hilarious, Mike. It is also horribly feasible.

It was lovely to hear Emmur happy, for once.

I was distracted by the heat and my cat's mood (sullen and argumentative) so missed the bit about why the pub had gone downhill. Is it that Oliver used, unknown to Kenton, to manage supplies and rotate the contents of the drinks cabinet? And then Kenton fired him for being slow at serving, and it's now a shambles?

I thought they hadn’t fired Oliver as the customers liked him despite his slowness. I have low expectations of Kenton & Toby, it’s hard to imagine either of them engaging with mundane tasks.

Thank you for the new thread! It’s all very slow at the moment isn’t it? I didn’t listen for a fortnight but very little has happened it seems - wasn’t worth the 2 hours spent catching up anyway.

I didn’t understand the issue in the pub. Had Oliver taken it upon himself to rotate the stock but done it badly? Or had he done it then someone else did it too?

It was another of those not-letting-the-other-person-speak scenes - infuriating and overdone!

Long time lurker, very occasional poster popping up to say I couldn't work out what the significance of Oliver rotating the stock was. It was all very confusing, and I didn't get why they kept trying to make Toby say something and then not allow him to finish his sentence. Just one more rubbish thing amongst many at the moment.

I got the impression that what Toby was trying to say was "It's all Oliver's fault" -- which leads me to believe that whatever it was, Toby did it and is now trying to evade the blame. He is a liar, so why not about this?

It was lovely to hear Emmur happy, for once.

Except she and the others have been banging on so much about how wonderful it's all going to be that you just know it's the precursor to Impending Doom. So we're all going to pay by having to listen to several episodes of Emmur moaning about how it's not fair and the whole world has got it in for MeAnEd.

I thought Toby was making some sort of point about them needing more staff if anything, though I'm not too sure what's happened to the staff they had. Is Oliver still working there?

It sounded to me as though Oliver was quietly doing all the little jobs without being asked but now he’s not there, so they are being neglected. Did they sack Oliver?

Yeah, I'm confused about Oliver too. I remember Lillian wanting to get rid of him, but Kenton didn't, but don't remember it being mentioned again. Yet now it appears that he's been given the sack, and because he's not there now, all those little jobs are no longer getting done.

Ginger wine with ice sounded rather appealing

Mind you, anything with ice would be very welcome this afternoon.

33° here just now 😓

It's cracking the flags, as we say here in Lancashire.

I wish Adam would stop saying 'WHAT?', and trying not very successfully to sound incredulous

I love ginger wine, haven’t had it for years though.

Just reading the latest posts, when this ad popped up! Managed to snap a quick screenshot.

Has Gnasher managed to infiltrate MN, in the guise of Fruit Juice Girl

@chemenger Just had to tell you that a woman at work was being very very annoying today and the phrase “ I hope she gets kicked in the head by a horse and wakes up an atheist” popped into my mind!

Jazzer's so going to go to the police/contact Crimestoppers, isn't he?

I'm glad that Pat pointed out about Rex's pigs not being organic, because it sounded like Tom wouldn't mention it.

I actually shouted at the radio, "Alistair, Shut the fk up!" several times

Surely all of Tom's branding and packaging which he will have bought in the 1000s all have "organic" emblazoned all over them? Not to mention that his contracts with shops/pubs are for buying organic sausages at a premium price. There's no way his customers will accept paying the same price for non-organic, no matter how local, free-range and tickled behind the ears the pigs are. But of course none of this will have occurred to the big-shot sausage king.

And I thought part of the point with organic was that it's a big effort to be certified organic - you don't just tick a box and whack a sticker on your product (wasn't there an issue with Rob ordering the wrong pig food years ago, or is the heat blasting my brain?* ). So, you wouldn't just throw that away without a lot of thought.

*hottest place in Britain where I am apparently in ambridge by the C.

Motoko
Jazzer's so going to go to the police/contact Crimestoppers, isn't he?

When he does, Jim may well say "I want nothing to do with this" and refuse to cooperate. They are all treating him as if he were the criminal, not the victim: cross-questioning him and chivvying him and never allowing him to have had a pleasant afternoon without spoiling it by dragging in "and you were abused as a child" when he gets home. It's time they listened to what he is saying and did as he wants, just for a change, instead of trying to make him do what they want.

WRT Jim, just let him be. It’s all so boring atm, I don’t think I’d notice if I missed a couple of weeks

Totally agree. Perhaps the SW should ring that helpline number that the continuity announcer mentions at the end of the episode, "If you've been affected by..." and learn what their characters should NOT be doing.

The synopses on the podcasts can be useful ... I think the chaos at The Bull was just because Oliver wasn't there that day quietly doing things (that doesn't explain the lack of ginger wine but surely that's only drunk in the Xmas/new year hols?).

But even better, it's reminded me of 'fungusopolis'. Is Terry Button a mycologist?

^ Kirsty’s had her induction shift with the Wildlife Trust. At The Bull, Adam asks if she’s heard of anyone else applying for Peggy’s fund. Toby’s heard that Terry Button is applying; he wants to turn Ambridge into Fungusopolis.
Toby wonders how Kenton’s feeling after a night on the Scruff gin punch. It might explain why so many mistakes have slipped through today. When Kirsty’s left waiting a long time for her drink, Kenton and Lilian go to investigate. Toby explains that the cellar hasn’t been properly restocked. Oliver has been picking up the slack since Jolene’s been on tour. He’s been doing everything.^

Another one shrieking at Alistair: Pack it in you mithering get. As for piling on the guilt by saying how it had after him and so Jim should do something,

Agree re Alistair but I think that its interesting that the writers are exploring the impact on the families of survivors of sexual abuse. This is all new news to Alistair and Fiona and it is raking up a lot of stuff for them about their childhood and relationship with their dad. They are angry at the abuser but also with Jim for having this secret and not realising the impact it was having on his family

I am bewildered. When they were discussing the sighting of whichever variety of bird it was/wasn't that Robert had spotted, Jim closed the scene with, "If saying it would only make it so."
It was obviously a quotation so I googled to find which bit of Virgil / Horace / Ovid it was and ...
For a change, is Jazzer teaching Jim about culture. And, even more amazingly, was Jim listening?

I am very far behind- has anyone mooted possibility that Peggy’s fund will go to a joint project on condition that they work together- my money is on Grundy and Adam project