🎄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?

My list for Father Christmas

In the next few weeks I’d like:

• Freddie’s show to be a huge success

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

Gavin to have been a horse all along.

Kirsty to decide that being single is just fine or meet someone nice and live happily ever after.

• Pip to disappear up her own arse, ideally having everyone realise what a vile cow she is.

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

Only Emma will have been right, and Ed will be the good guy

• 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

Yes. Ideally, she will get an amazing job with an engineering company

Shula to decide not to become a vicar

Natasha's sending habits to come to light.

Rex to get the council farm.

Great list, Duchess!

@Roysnewshirt,

LillianGish
AskingQuestions - I think it was Eileen Pugsley (not Ellen).

You are right! and I am the victim of a complicated attempt to correct a typo. I originally wrote "Elleen", know it was wrong, and corrected it in the wrong direction, after which of course it no longer had a red wiggly line under it and I missed thinking any further.

There seems to be some sort of slight controversy attached to council farms around here so I wonder if this is the Archers attempt to reflect real life.

Not sure what it is though as not really that interested ....

Emma told Chris of her concerns about Alice only to be dealt a barrage of abuse from both of them. I think she deserves an apology.

I think Chris would benefit from talking to Ed.

I felt that Alice forbidding Chris from talking to Emma was significant. A is forcing C to choose between them (never a good move). A is forcing C to go through this alone, with no support.
It felt like the first crack in the ice, as if it was the beginning of the end for their marriage. Chris has loved and supported her so far but he's not getting much in return at the moment.

A marriage in which one person constantly feels superior to the other, and the other feels she is superior to him, was always likely to be built on sand to some extent, I feel.

This is something Brian didn't point out even though he may well have thought it, and Jennifer (who was a King Cophetua's beggar-maid herself) wouldn't have thought of.

Farming Today was banging on about council farms recently (I thought a lot of councils had sold them off). That's probably why this storyline is included. If it means that we get Fairbrother Snr in a few more episodes, I'll suspend my disbelief.

Surely Alice and Chris would have a better understanding of detox. Wouldn't people be suspicious if their family member/friend suddenly upped sticks for a fortnight? I like to think my mates would be round to check under the patio.

This is our nearest residential detox place, I think (and I wonder if this is what they had in mind):

www.actiononaddiction.org.uk/addiction-treatment/clouds-house

There's a lovely pub in the village (and I was sufficiently intrigued to google why Clouds House would be so well signposted).

That's probably why this storyline is included.

I always think the Farming Today stories are planted to support The Archers, rather than the other way round!

That detox place is exactly as I would have imagined - surely must be where they were thinking of, being vaguely close to Bath?

Chris said to Alice - this isn't just about the baby. He knows their relationship won't survive if she doesn't quit.
Cloud house looks lovely, I wonder if we will get to hear about Alice's roommate.

That was a boring week.

Oh god. She's going to shag someone in the rehab isnt she.

I haven't listened yet. Having just seen that last comment am now desperate to!

Does anyone boil mincemeat in a saucepan on the stove?

Presumably you do, you boil jam.

@AskingQuestionsAllTheTime

Does anyone boil mincemeat in a saucepan on the stove?

I think you just mix the ingredients together.

www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/traditional-mincemeat

www.maryberry.co.uk/recipes/christmas/special-mincemeat

Jill will have her own recipe, which may well include boiling.

Shame Leonard isn't the one called Vince - it could be vincemeat

How disappointing that Gavin managed to convince Kirsty that he’s over the gambling. We could have had Kirsty and Gav being shown around the rehab only to bump into a familiar face.

Jill will have her own recipe, which may well include boiling
I have a recipe for Jill which most certainly would.

Mincemeat is not jam. It does not need - and would indeed be ruined by - boiling, there being little free liquid except the alcohol.

About time Jill had a good, long sit-down. In a chair.

Delia Smith says to put it in the oven for a long time at a low heat. This melts the suet and the melted fat coats all the other ingredients and helps with the keeping qualities. Works for us. I make a batch every other year and it's so full of spices, sugar, melted fat and brandy that it lasts over a year.