Archers thread #114: Bull banished, Bali beaches beckon, bickering bullshitters burgeon

[Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g]

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

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 Gavin to stay around, 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 for all thread title suggestions! I've gone with a B theme which with a bit of luck will seem odd and irrelevant by the end of this thread. Here's hoping, anyway.

Haven't caught up with tonight's episode yet, so off to do that shortly.

You beat me to it lillian, I straight away thought natasha is having an affair.

I thought the Beechwood houses were supposed to be affordable homes.

To me, that suggests compact, no frills accommodation - not four-bed detacheds with multiple bathrooms.

Some of the Beechwood houses were affordable housing.

I thought the Beechwood houses were supposed to be affordable homes.
I think it was a condition of planning permission that a proportion of the estate had to be affordable, not all of it.
I cannot see that Joy would be eligible - no local connections (neither family nor employment) and no dependents.

There ended up being one "affordable home" as far as I could make out. Justin was proposing the minimum, which on eighteen houses would probably be two, and then claimed that would be too expensive for him and reduced the number, much to Pat's fury. It's possible the "affordable" reduction was from three to two, I suppose.

I still don't think that eighteen houses on three and a half acres is particularly grand; round here the expensive new houses have an acre or more of garden each.

The "executive" new builds around here, don't have very big gardens.

Well done to the scion of DDD!

If they are of a literary bent there's usually an intern post at BBC radio that's always keen on good new writers ...

Philip is going to go ballistic. So that'll be interesting.

Kirsty is a bit wet really isn't she? If Gavin had spoken to me like that I couldn't have been so polite. I wish she'd just snap and tell him a load of home truths.

Oh and congratulations to SonSonSon. I went to Scumbag former Polytechnic more years ago than I care to think about so have no idea how it all works these days but I can imagine he is very chuffed right now.

So how much would a four bed detached, in a rural Midlands village, cost?

So how much would a four bed detached, in a [very naice] rural Midlands village, cost?
£635,000 Ouch.

Surely Kirsty would be straight on the phone to Philip the moment Gavin left the house. I shall be very annoyed if she doesn't tell him.

Thing is - they’ve very carefully laid the groundwork for Kirsty to have transitioned from independent woman to person living in a house she couldn’t possibly afford alone. Obviously she’ll be more secure once they’re married (if it happens) but I should think she’s feeling her position rather, at the moment.

And of course running to Philip, again, will be incredibly awkward - what if he doesn’t take her side this time?

Either way they’re brewing a perfectly horrible story.

She could always go back to Willow Farm.

Going to the funeral is what Jim wants to do. Let's just hope they're not planning to make him do something un-Jim-like like stand up in the middle of the funeral service and denounce the guy.

I agree with other posters about Gavin being another pantomime villain.

I think if his father is remarrying & they work together - family business or is he an employee? - he has reasonable questions about the impact that will have on the future of the business & his position in it before you even start to think about the personal side with inheritance etc or what happens if Kirsty & Philip have children. He's obnoxious but I think he is not unusual in not immediately being overjoyed about another wedding. If they made him a more sympathetic character these themes could be explored more effectively. How many people on here post about problems with family businesses, inheritance in blended families, not getting on with step children or step parents etc? People would relate to these stories, but they have taken the easy route & made him a baddie

Surely there's a risk that if Jim goes to the funeral he'll be "triggered" (sorry, for straying into a bit of psycho-babble): with the memories being raked up and the emotional intensity of a funeral service, won't he do that "little boy" reversion that we've heard before (brilliantly acted, by the way, with Jim's voice going higher and more whiny)? Then he'll have to run out (as he did at his party) and realise he made a big mistake.

But as others have said, who is going to stop Jim if this is what he's decided to do?

At the unwanted party which was foisted on him against his will Jim was taken completely by surprise; this time he is deliberately going into the situation with his eyes wide open, knowing what to expect.

I expect that the editorial team will cause him to become a gibbering wreck (mostly because of the pestering do-gooders refusing to leave him alone for as much as a minute) to underline the need to Grieve Along Proper Party Lines, just as Kirsty had to be badgered into a breakdown over her miscarriage, but in real life I'd think Jim knows better than Jazzer and Alistair possibly can what it is that he needs.

I'm struggling to believe that Peggy is (or ever was) an avid Coronation Street viewer.

She strikes me as the sort of woman who only has a television for The News (BBC of course) and the occasional wildlife documentary.

So what's with all the Corrie cat names?

Hilda Ogden arrived with the name when Fabrice left his partner and couldn't find a flat that he could take a cat to, so Peggy offered to haveher. I assume the partner didn't want to offer Hilda a home, and who would blame them?

So who named the kitten that they are keeping then?

I doubt Peggy would know that Hilda Ogden's husband was called Stan.

Obviously Joy, being a common Northerner, watches Corrie all day long, so the name Ena, for her kitten, seems logical.

So what's with all the Corrie cat names?
Probs an in-joke. Don't forget the ratings-war-scandal where TA decided to burn down Grace Archer as a spoiler against the first night of Corrie.

I wonder who eventually bought Ed and Emmur's house?

I thought Grace died on the first night of ITV.

Thanks for the new thread @Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g . Awesome alliteration!

I thought Grace died on the first night of ITV.
Opps, you're right. First night of ITV was 1955. Corrie didn't begin until 1960.
They are mere upstarts.