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.

I thought that was an excellent portrayal of a woman who has lost her dignity and her agency (can’t go to the toilet without help, can’t choose her own scarves). Very moving.

I like ‘the village that time forgot’ for a thread title.

Poor Ben. Such mean siblings.

Is Lynda planning to do herself in?

Whether Lynda intended what she said to Freddie to be cruel or not, it was cruel.

Well, as I said, that's not how it came across to me.

Getting that lot off her chest will probably have done her more good, psychologically at least, than any of the treatment she's had so far

Oh well, that's all right then.

What exactly is she going to die of, do we reckon? I think the constipation is probably a red herring

That was rotten of Clare or whatever her name is. Ben's well rid of her. Hope we don't get her foisted upon us in the shape of Josh's girlfriend, the fact she has a voice doesn't augur well.

WheresThatCatGoneNow I am amazed that you do not think that being told a person you rescued from death at risk of your own life wishes that you hadn't bothered is not cruel. It is a horrible and cruel thing to be told.

Still, if it made Lynda feel psychologically a bit better to say something so bitter to a young man who had tried to help her (and will now be vacillating between wishing he hadn't bothered and wishing that he were dead himself, in between flashbacks to the trauma) that's ok then, isn't it.

You are entitled to your opinion, just as I am to mine.

"Cruel" has overtones of intent.

Lynda nearly died, has been disoriented and in agony since rescue, is still wishing she had simply died, has put on a brave face for Robert, tolerated wittering bollocks from unwanted visitors. Its a miracle she hasn't snapped before being asked to do performative gratitude by the well meaning but struggling Robert.

It didn't surprise me that the person she broke down with was the one person who had shared the experience with her. Her first concern when talking to Robert was Blake and for him to know she forgave him.

These are not the behaviours of a cruel person. Just someone who in extremis broke down for a few minutes.

There is no intent in phrases such as "a cruel winter" or "a cruel twist of fate. Nor did I say, and nor do I think, that Lynda is a cruel person.

None the less, Lynda said incredibly cruel things to Freddie.

I assume this is explained by her having been in great pain, and with her mind fuddled with drugs; in her right mind she would not be so unaware of, or so uncaring about, the probable effect of her words on a person who had done his best for her and whom she regards as a child.

I assume this is explained by her having been in great pain, and with her mind fuddled with drugs

I have often been very critical of the writing but not at the moment. We know that Lynda is a woman of strong emotions. We saw her jump to assumptions about Freddie and then become very distressed at what she had done when Johnny explained what had happened. In the same way, she has had run ins with Lilian before the B business - like when Lil stood to be a parish councillor - and also with Fallon over the fete. Now she is being similarly forthright as she is faced with a life changing condition.

I agree with C8h10n402 that having faced death with Freddie, she did not feel bound by social conventions to say all was well. She has always been abrasive on occasion but underneath she has a kind heart.

I am really hoping that her message for Blake leads to something important.

There is no intent in phrases such as "a cruel winter" or "a cruel twist of fate.

I said "overtones". When cruelty is attributed to the actions of a person I'm struggling to see the lack of implied intent.

We will need to disagree on this one.

I'm with the majority here. Lynda needed to say those things or she'd go mad. I love Robert but he'd be driving me round the bend with his attempts to get Lynda to think of others before herself. She's exhausted and she should be having no visitors at all except Robert unless she asks to see someone.

It would ring true if during the Home Recording Interlude Freddie did a two-hander with a counsellor whose contribution would be limited to a few words at the beginning and the occasional 'Go on ...'. He could unburden himself about all sorts of things, just like Elizabeth did last year.

(New thread later today or maybe first thing tomorrow, I'd say - I'm on standby!)

(BTW, I know there are many other Cabin Pressure fans here - have you all seen that Arthur Shappey is broadcasting on YouTube from Carolyn's granny flat? Cabin Fever. Details on this thread: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/radio_addicts/3858437-Anyone-want-to-know-how-Arthur-Shappey-is-getting-on-with-self-isolation )

Thinking about Ben & Josh, surely they wouldn’t really go & visit Lynda? Do young men really want to go & see a unrelated older woman in hospital? I would have thought they’d have just said no to Ruth. They could have just left the basket of goodies on Robert’s doorstep.

Yes it was ridiculous that Josh and Ben were there. Robert needs bloody telling, putting the curiosity/wants of any random in the village above the needs of his seriously injured wife is horrible to listen to. He’s like one of the husbands you hear about on here letting every single member of his extended family come around to cuddle a new baby while his wife is crying and leaking in a corner.

I wonder if Chloe has a voice because she is also going to turn up at the hospital with Lynda and/or Blake?

Mind you, the SWs must be cursing that they chose to make her a doctor just at the point when no F1 doctor in the whole of England has the time or energy to have a social life, let alone a sex life.

Yes ... I wondered if Chloe might be incorporated into any virus story 'going forward'.

I'm missing Susan! She's been back from her hols for ages now.

The day after my emergency caesarean, my parents brought some random friends of theirs into the hospital. I hadn't seen them in 20 years

I just can't get over Ben's voice. He sounds like he's emerged from the cereal cupboard aged about 38 and probably an insurance salesman from Berkshire, (with an excellent pension fund), who enjoys dressing up and doing a bit of English civil war re-enactment at the weekend.

He's definitely related to 'new Pip' but makes Josh sound like the odd-one-out pipsqueak relative of 'old Pip'. Odd!

Yes it was ridiculous that Josh and Ben were there.
Not half as weird as a conversation between the unlikely combination of Josh, Brine and Joy. In a lambing shed.
We are in strange times, even in CV-free Ambridge.

I think that Lynda will find out about Blake and the other horses (somebody has to!) and will get her super-sleuthing, injustice-fighting, interfering mojo back.

I think that Lynda will find out about Blake and the other horses (somebody has to!) and will get her super-sleuthing, injustice-fighting, interfering mojo back. that would be beyond ridiculous. And therefore quite likely.

Maybe we're in for a period where Lynda relapses back into silent semi-consciousness, and everyone in the village takes it in turns to soliloquise at her bedside.

Yes it was ridiculous that Josh and Ben were there

Totally.

And what was the scenario that justified Josh bumping into Roy and then telling Roy all about not being prosecuted?

Why would Roy and Josh be anywhere together during the day and why on earth tell Roy about this?

Yes, lottiegarbanzo!

I too was at Ben's voice.

He sounds about 40.