❓ Archers thread #126: It’s a mystery why we’re all still listening.

[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 love to be on the Parish Council, 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/4197199--The-Archers-spoilers-thread-6-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 @LillianGish and @Taswama for thread title ideas, but I felt most in sympathy with @R4's suggestion. Is it me, or is the programme in the doldrums at the moment?

Haven't heard the 31/3 episode yet. Perhaps it's a gem.

When the lanterns were found in the field, I think she said they were from Beechwood, while shuddering with horror

She was angry, as was Tony, at random crap which harmed the animals being scattered with no thought. I assumed at the time it was one of those ham fisted public education pieces for townies who dare to live in the country.

Am I the only one who hoped Kirsty was coming to announce she was going to Australia to train as an ecologist? I’m so sick of her.
Emma would be the best person for Alice to confide in but there is no doubt that her family of devoted drinkers need to know, otherwise she will be undermined at every turn.

Emma would be the best person for Alice to confide in but there is no doubt that her family of devoted drinkers need to know, otherwise she will be undermined at every turn.

Yes I think Emma might initially explode but in some respects she's like Debbie - able to be very practical and deal with difficult situations. Debbie just usually manages to bypass the initial explosions [grins]

Oh yes, the yurts ...

From the moment Kate derailed the Home Farm partners' meeting with her wild threats of legal action I've found it pretty impossible to believe this story. And really it's seemed as if the TA creative team weren't particularly convinced either, given the way they threw the senior Aldridges into a peasant house and then forgot about them ...

Brian was entertaining on the subject this week, but I almost resent this new mention of Home Farm because I just know I'm going to be disappointed again.

Speaking of houses, didn't Neil and Mike single handedly (with all their arms tied behind their back and one eye between them) build Ambridge View brick by brick? There's absolutely no reason why Helen and Lee couldn't order a flat pack house and deposit it somewhere on Bridge Farm Land. (And if only the Beechwood area could get planning permission then the BF Archers should have kept a piece back for their own future needs.)

Sadly I'll never hear, in any episode, a discussion of the difference in price between a self-build on your own land and an executive new build on someone else's land ...

Do we think Alice did drink the wine? I know they were setting up that way with her keeping it and not telling Chris and she sounded pissed when trying to undo the buttons but I sounded the same at times when sleep deprived with a newborn.

You must have missed last night's episode, (Thursday,) MazekeenSmith!

Well I love Kirsty anyway.

The difference in price between a self-build and an executive home is immaterial, as these aren't normal prices, they are Borsetshire prices.

I love Kirsty too. She’s always decent and proactive and her politics aren’t as true blue as most of Ambridge.

I was hoping that Alice was going to say she'd realised they needed to tell her parents about the situation. There's no way they can avoid alcohol without a lot of support. The desperation of Alice wanting to feed Martha brought tears to my eyes as well.

I love Kirsty too. She’s always decent and proactive
Is it decent and proactive to bounce your best friend into a living-together arrangement? It seemed to be more about her demented Do-Gooding, just like the hunt for the Horses.

I sort of zoned out when she explained how she got the house. Did she say that the scuzzy flat paid for the Proceeds of Crime fine and she now had a brand new (mortgage free?) 5-bed house all of her own? I am trying not to listen to the finance side of TA, it never makes sense.

Everybody told me that she had no financial interest in the big fancy house, but now she owns it and can let it out?

Well @R4 I’m cutting her a bit of slack for the current madness. The poor woman has had a crap few years hasn’t she, I can’t think of a single story where she hasn’t been fucked over.

Philip was always very cagey about how much money he had - pleading poverty when he'd been willing to fund the wedding in Bali etc.
I think he had far more assets than he told Gavin when selling up. And somehow ring fenced the house for Kirsty (maybe to protect some of his assets in case he ever got caught). Whilst I don't think he ever thought he was really guilty I think he was very capable of double thought and lying to himself.

I don't think Chris wants people to know any more than Alice does (possibly even less, Alice isn't thinking straight). If they know his marriage isn't perfect then it will bring him down to the level of his sister and his other relatives rather than the pedestal he has enjoyed being on.

Kirsty seems to have decided that it’s ok to take the house and rent it out rather than sell it and share the proceeds with Blake and the two other slaves. Funny how she has gone from combing the streets for them like a madwoman to profiting from their unpaid work without batting an eyelid.

She appears to be better off now financially than she has ever been - sitting pretty on the profits of crime. We know she didn’t contribute to the house so if it is so distasteful to her she could say she wants none of it and give it away to the boys or a modern slavery charity for instance - not hold onto it (with a view to putting it up for sale when prices have gone up and things have blown over)...

I absolutely agree Roysnewshirt where’s the horse searching virtue signaller now she has her mitts on a substantial asset? Phillip was a divorced jobbing builder, there’s no way he had legitimate funds to buy a five bedroom house outright. She’s happily generating an income from the proceeds of crime.

Hello, @Itishwhatitis! Welcome to the thread.

Maybe Kirsty can't sell the house while Philip's name is on the deeds. She can't divorce him for quite a while yet, IIRC. I hope that's not the end of the slavery storyline. I'd like to know what's happened to the lads.

Totally agree about the odd hanging storyline of selling up Home Farm and then ..... nothing. At least Brian's not forgotten.

Chris and Alice made for painful listening. I was wrong, of course, to think she might not have been drinking. They really need to tell the Aldridges and the Carters asap. Emma already knows a lot of it, of course, and Ed probably does too. (When did we last hear Ed, btw? It feels like years.)

I see that the BBC has taken the apocalyptic line that Prince Philip's death is such a major event that everything else is cancelled, including the repeat of The Archers. Isn't that not far off the sign to our nuclear submarines that the end is nigh?

I wonder if he'll get a topical insert next week.

I think the SW's told us that Beechwood was mortgaged to the hilt, and in Philip's name only (I am not sure that Kirsty had been with him for very long and she was just changing jobs when they bought it)?

So somehow Philip has managed to pay the mortgage and utilities for 4 months with all his assets frozen and now is Kirsty taking over the mortgage but converting it to a "buy to let"? On her income furloughed at Grey Gables and the pittance from the Wildlife Trust.

It would have been more fun to have Brian and Jenny buy that house.

I would love it if Kirsty’s lady bountiful act of letting Helen have the house runs aground and Brian and Jenny buy it from a repossession auction. How Brian would crow over Kirsty!

@MayIDestroyYou

You must have missed last night's episode, (Thursday,) MazekeenSmith!

Oops! I thought I had caught them all up.

I had really hoped Alice had poured the wine away MazekeenSmith

I think the SW's told us that Beechwood was mortgaged to the hilt

And we questioned that at the time as I recall. We all thought Phillip probably had a lot more money than he made out. I wish this had been confirmed though.

He told someone that it was mortgaged to the hilt, but he is not a reliable narrator.

And he seemed to think that without having sold the Beechwood house, he could afford to buy the house in Wales that he was planning to do up and live in. I remember Kirsty saying that they had got that Welsh house and how happy she was about it.

I remember Kirsty saying that they had got that Welsh house and how happy she was about it

Lucky Kirsty! What a property tycoon she has now become...

Really? He is just looking forward to swanking around wearing one of those horrible papooses demonstrating what a great dad he is
Intermittent Seahorse Syndrome? Makes one spew, on the whole, particularly as I suspect there is no correlation to getting up in the night/ dealing with the really messy stuff.

I find men swanning around in pappooses (sp?) quite hot