Archers thread #116: Pandemic fears, markets crash but it's BOOM 💥 time for Ambridge. Discuss The Archers here.

[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 to employ Philip Moss & Son to fix your soil pipe, 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! (New thread likely to be replacing that one very soon, in the current circumstances.)

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 @SurpriseSparDay for the thread title idea, which I tweaked, and @springydaff for the 💥 emoticon, which I hope is in the title! (Can't preview the title). Welcome, lurkers and lapsed listeners, drawn out of the shadows by the current crisis in Ambridge. In the OP of the last thread I said I didn't think we'd get to Easter on that thread. We certainly didn't!

I am very worried indeed about Lynda and concerned about Oliver too. Don't care about Gavin unless it means Kirsty is cheated out of yet another wedding. Freddie's redemption is now assured, though, surely? Roll on the return of the Lower Loxley crew.

Just as well they hung onto the old pub-sign, isn't it?

no, it isn't. It is like saying that being run into if you walk out into the road without looking is your own stupid fault.

The drunkness or otherwise of the driver is not relevant; the walking out into traffic is what causes you to be hit by a car. (Or a van, or a lorry, or a bus.)

Lynda was injured because of her own behaviour. I said nothing about whether she deserved it or not; I said it was a case of cause and effect. Had she not behaved badly and high-handedly, she would not have been injured, and nor would Freddie. Blake still might have been, and that would have been a consequence of his own stupidity -- though as it happened it was a consequence of his stupidity and Lynda's busybodying.

When I deliver to a site, and yes, sometimes it is a house being refurbished, I am not allowed on site without PPE. The kitchen at Grey Gables should have been declared out of bounds to anybody not connected to the job. Also, petrol used on any job where there is the slightest possibility of a spark is a no no. And, the only door in the kitchen that should have been unlocked is the fire exit, in fact, as a solvent was being used Blake should have been wearing goggles and a mask.

No because running into a road without looking is known to be risky behaviour, walking into a kitchen is not, I would say the same if it was Russ who had done it which is saying something.

As DoctorTwo says, walking onto a building site when you have no actual business there is definitely not encouraged, for a number of reasons one of which is that it is likely to be unsafe. Lynda walked into a building site.

In any event Lynda was injured because she did something which was of itself high-handed: she stated that she had the intention of telling someone how to behave. It was none of her business to do so. Furthermore, in order to butt into someone else's business she was neglecting the job for which Oliver pays her: she is supposed to be a receptionist, not management or a foreman.

That she suffered a severe penalty for it does not make her behaviour any better.

So yes; Lynda's culpability lies only in her going into a part of the hotel which was not where she was supposed to be or ever is supposed to be, when she was on duty at reception, in order to interrupt someone doing a job of work there and tell him to be quiet.

We don't know that there's any sort of ban on her going into the kitchen, so long as she doesn't leave Reception deserted - I suspect it's quite common for her to go in there in the normal run of things, e.g. to fetch a coffee.

And she didn't go in to tell the workman to keep quiet, she went in to investigate because the noises sounded like something odd was going on. It's a normal human reaction - if I heard a workman in the next room to my office making noises which sounded like he was knocking metal shelves down when he wasn't supposed to, I might well go and check rather than keep my head down and wait for someone else. I couldn't hear any suggestion whatsoever that she expected the workman to work in silence.

And if the kitchen was dangerous it needed to be out of bounds which would make it olivers fault.

It is like saying that being run into if you walk out into the road without looking is your own stupid fault.

It really isn't. It is obvious that if you walk out into a road without looking you risk getting hurt. It is in no way obvious that if you walk into a hotel kitchen that you have walked into countless times before, you risk an explosion.

Unless Lynda lit the grill, the suggestion that she caused Blake's injuries is particularly bizarre. If he tried to sue her, he would be laughed out of court.

Oh, so when Lynda said "I can't apologise with all this noise" and that she would tell him to keep the noise down and Freddie wasn't to go away, what she meant was "Oh dear, it sounds as if that poor man in there is having trouble; I will go in, although I am utterly unqualified as well as seventy-three years old, and tell him how to do his job offer him assistance."

Nerts she did. She was being her usual buttinski self.

And yes, as the Investigation Report clearly stated, Lynda opening the door did cause the explosion. She did not know that it would, but it did; and the explosion did injure Blake. So yes, her opening the door caused him to be injured. He might have caused an explosion himself, but he had not done so.

As I say, blame and cause are not the same thing. Blake's actions and Lynda's actions caused the explosion. Neither, I assume, intended it. Nevertheless they both did cause it, by doing what they did.

I am so chuffed that the only time I borrowed Bore's 🔮** it showed me truth. Lynda's horrific accident WAS a just an excuse to scrap the b@shit name change idea.

I wish they hadn't done any of it but I'll miss it when it's gone.

He might have caused an explosion himself, but he had not done so.

Yes, he caused the explosion (subject to the Lynda turning on the grill exception). If you use something flammable as a solvent in the vicinity of an ignition source, an explosion is going to happen, whether a door is opened or not. If you are the only person in the room, the only thing that will stop it is you shutting off the ignition source and/or getting rid of the source of fumes and dispersing them. Opening the door was the final step in the chain, but it would have been utterly harmless but for what went before.

Claiming that it's Lynda's fault is like blaming the parents of a child when a car mounts the pavement and knocks the child over, because the child wouldn't have been in the car's path had the parents not taken the child out at that particular time.

@inkysplatter, the 🔮 always shows the truth. It says that sometimes the one doing the reading misinterprets that which is being revealed though.

after a fortuitously hilarious misspelling on a (random) thread some months ago. I really relish the idea of this gift voucher lovingly offered by husband to wife ...

Now this is really just an excuse for me to use SurpriseSparDay’s name to moan that a spa voucher for Grey Gables seems to be the standard present in The Archers. It’s as bad as Pat and her leek and potato soup that she serves up every day for lunch. Shula has it almost every day too.

With all the 💥 and the aftermath, we don’t yet know how Natasha’s plans for her office base are going. I know it is not very kind but it would make interesting listening to have debt and destruction at Bridge Farm because of Natasha.

Boop for Ed and Emma’s conversations this week. I would like to see them get back together.

Impressive 🔮 inkysplatter! Must practise the old sign which I have never had a chance to use.

for the win! Dreadful idea to put Lynda through all this to achieve the return of the old name, though.

I wonder what the HSE report will say about the accident. I'm no H&S expert but they would be involved, wouldn't they? I'm also waiting impatiently to hear what Philip's and GG's insurers are making of all this.

[ archers ] without the spaces gives you , btw

I'm also waiting impatiently to hear what Philip's and GG's insurers are making of all this.
I'm also waiting impatiently to hear about Gavin. We haven't heard the Philip/Gavin conversation. Is he still living with Phirsty; why hasn't he featured since the explosion?

The 🔮 says that Gavin will be the one most at fault - it suspects it will be he who told the witless Blake to deploy the petrol.

Yes and then buggered off to play on the xbox.

Oh god. They're doing the same 'follow the lady' trick with Lynda and Roy as they did with Helen and Nigel.

They're doing the same 'follow the lady' trick with Lynda and Roy as they did with Helen and Nigel.
Good spot!
Somebody did say a while back that Roy was surplus to requirements these days, having lost all connections bar Phoebe.
But please don't let Lizzie go on another tail-spin. I couldn't bear that.

The 🔮 says that Gavin will be the one most at fault - it suspects it will be he who told the witless Blake to deploy the petrol

... and then suggested he put the grill on if he felt a bit chilly,

You can't blame Pat for dishing up leek and potato soup every day, she is Welsh, after all.

I have a dim memory of carrot and coriander being served up in the past. Not a favourite of mine, so I have suppressed the memory.

Sorry to be stupid, but what’s the “follow the lady” trick?

Oh lord - Ed n Emma sharing domestic labour, watching family video, lol-ing and flirting ... I believe the correct phrase is “all the feelz”?

😍😍😍