🎄Archers thread #122: Deck the Hall with Eddie, Freddie 🎵 'Tis the Season to be jolly (but orange juice for you, Alice)

[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 love Bert Fry’s poetry (as I do), 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/3853783--The-Archers-spoilers-thread-5-Cant-wait-for-7-02pm-Join-us-here, 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 @C8H10N4O2 for requesting an annoyingly cheerful thread title which might take us up to Christmas and to @Prestissimo for the title suggestion. I was strongly tempted by @LillianGish’s suggestion: Eddie’s turkeys, Freddie’s show, village green with lights aglow, Stir Up Sunday, Deck the Hall, Merry Christmas one and all - with apologies to Bert Fry and @R4’s suggestion Wassail to the Ambridge Not-A-Panto where Freddie gets nine LESSONS in directing from CAROLe Lynda. Top work, all!

Three days to go until we can return to Ambridge.

My list for Father Christmas

In the next few weeks I’d like:

• Freddie’s show to be a huge success

• Philip and Gavin to be driven out of the village with pitchforks into the waiting arms of the police, and the three ‘horses’ rescued and taken in by kind people who will help them turn their lives around

• Pip to take a perpetual vow of silence and leave for a nunnery

• a terrific Grundy Christmas (although the travails of Alice and Chris will overshadow things)

• Alice to lose the baby, as this seems the least grim option for us listeners; she leaves Chris and makes a fresh start of some kind

What do you all want for Christmas from The Archers?

@BoreOfWhabylon

MysticBore™️ predicts:

We have just heard the Ambridge Relationship Fairy fluttering her wings over Jazzer and Tracy and sprinkling them with love-dust.

They just don't know it yet.

Called it earlier in the month, but we've since had Oliver thrown into the mix

Will Tracey go for older or younger man?

Also, place your bets for Cursedy and Roy to end up together after a decent interval.

Jazzer's only a quick shag. It would be terribly uninteresting to match them up long term. He's kind hearted but would bring absolutely nothing welcome to her life.

Help with Brad's UCAS form? Nope

Conversations on art? Nope.

Sailing? Skiing? Nope and nope.

Planning Chelsea's gap year or an internship? Nope.

Learning a new language before a foreign holiday? Nope.

Hunt ball? You're 'avin' a larf.

Honestly it would be grim. No broader horizons for her; just another load of washing in the machine and another pair of legs to trip over as she clears the dinner plates.

I'm inclined to agree Poule, but who knows what goes through the minds of the SWs?

Perhaps @Chemenger can ask the intern if anything has been revealed in the planning zoom calls.

Here we go ...

Delurking at this highly dramatic moment to say.....OMG

Woo Hooooo!

So do we now have to wait until Monday??

Well, felt sure we were going to have a cliffhanger, but no!

Poor Cursedy won't be having a very Merry Christmas

@Sunnysausage

So do we now have to wait until Monday??

Tuesday. They've swapped the days around next week. Clearly they've got something planned for New Year.

That was quite an episode.

Philip will lie to the police and get away with it.

@SunnySausage, it's worse than that, we have to wait till Tuesday 2pm (or 7pm). Those bastards are keeping us hanging on for an extra day next week. The payoff is we get a Friday episode. Friday next week is New Year's Day and the 70th anniversary of the very first nationally broadcast episode of The Archers, so I'm expecting fireworks. Having said that, I'd be OK with a nice quiet episode of change counting ...

Rob convinced her own family that he was actually the stable one and Helen was a fruitcake
Well yeah, things based upon truth tend to be believable. Helen is a fruitcake. That's why her family were so damned glad to be shot of her.

Roy is a ⭐️. And so is Kirsty actually.

It's true that everybody in the village was perfectly willing to credit whatever Rob said about Helen being a little ... eccentric ... without any question.

Bit anxious about The Grundy Clan as Clarke and Eddie were ever so grateful tonight which is often an ominous stage before a 'deading'.

I could've cheered when Phillip slipped up and referred to the horses.

Hmm ... I'd agree that Philip's natural inclination is always to lie - but he knows if he does now his brand new marriage is immediately over.

A full confession might leave a remote possibility that Kirsty stands by him. Poor woman - first married Christmas ...

That crossed my mind too, cameocat - but the Grundys have surely already had their fair share of deaths recently.

Fair play to Kirsty. Straight in.

Brilliant episode, can't believe we've to wait till Tuesday 😳

At last!

All is forgiven Roy. I wasn't that impressed with him earlier but he came round to check on her in the nick of time.

Looks like we'll need a new thread soon! Any title suggestions? I'll be able to look in briefly on and off tomorrow in case people get carried away.

Clarrie and Eddie were kind of another compare and contrast. But mainly the scene served to promise some sort of Grundy shindig 🎆. What date is their wedding anniversary?

Useful thread I've just noticed with details of where to listen to old episodes. www.mumsnet.com/Talk/radio_addicts/3020889-Past-Archers-omnibuses-omnibii-where-to-listen

@TheSilveryPussycat, 21st November 2021. A long way off!

Clarrie and Eddie were married on 21st November 1981. Not exactly an imminent anniversary then. (Now say that with ill-fitting false teeth!)

Why, apart from Plot Purposes, was Roy there? Philip's car or van was outside, so Kirsty wasn't going to be sitting alone and worrying, and until this evening Roy didn't seem much inclined to think Philip was evil and Kirsty needed protecting from him.

Why, apart from Plot Purposes, was Roy there? Philip's car or van was outside, so Kirsty wasn't going to be sitting alone and worrying, and until this evening Roy didn't seem much inclined to think Philip was evil and Kirsty needed protecting from him

I wondered that. Out for what he can get? In the way of mince pies and other such seasonal scran, I mean, rather than the contents of Kirsty's knickers.