🏘️ Archers thread #129: Casey, Macy, Lily, Alice – Decent types or full of malice? Discuss The Archers here.

[Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g]

Thank you, @PseudoBadger, for kicking off this long, long series of Archers threads, which has now passed 125,000 posts! (See below for further details.)

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 lust after Russ, or other unusual things.

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.)

For the thread title I was very tempted to go with @R4's title suggestion of Come follow the exploits of Brine, Lily, Elizabeth, Usha, Ruari, George and Helen. Know collectively as bleurgh. because on the last thread @DadDadDad, our invaluable statistician, identified a post from @ILoveShula as the 125,000th. Many of us felt it was fitting that the post simply said Bleurgh!.

However, feeling that was a bit niche for the casual listener, I adapted @MayIDestroyYou's title suggestion in the end. Thanks, MIDY!

Back to Ambridge this week, after our enjoyable sojourn at Lower Loxley last week! Will we go with Alice to rehab? (Hope not.) Will the petulant Adam make good his threat to leave Home Farm? (Hope so.) What will Jennifer say? (Lots, I hope, and preferably to Brian.) Will the fete be a triumph? (Of course it will.) Will we ever return to Brookfield, or have they all fallen unnoticed into the slurry pit? (Let's hope Pip did, anyway.) WHERE IS PAT? (Can't answer this one.)

Over to you!

No, because Ruairi has no Archer blood.

@WhoppingBigBackside

No, because Ruairi has no Archer blood.

Well, yes, I know that, but if he were Jenny's son he and Ben would be second cousins. They are 'family' by upbringing if not in blood was my sort of not very good point!

I don't necessarily get the vibe that he fancies Ben. Unusually (VERY) for The Archers though I think Ben and Ruairi are both quite loveable? they seem like sweet boys and if they do end up together I wish them all the best. However I feel like making a character bi and then having them only have same-sex relationships is too subtle a step for the scriptwriters, so I assume he'll at least have some doings with women in his future. Also of course there's no sign that Ben is anything other than straight. I enjoy the way both R & B are less "stereotypical" macho farming boys in their different ways - Ben wanting to become a nurse, Ruairi flirting with a bouncer. Nice to see the scriptwriters actually creating a friendship where the friends have things in common rather than just arbitrarily (Ian and Helen!?)

@WheresThatCatGoneNow

I knew Ruari wasn't 'straight'.

It's so obvious that he's in love with Ben.

I just hope that when Ben finds out, he doesn't react badly, and make Ruari feel like he is the lowest form of life on earth.

I've been there. I know.

Hope that wasn't your experience @WheresThatCatGoneNow

That would make Jennifer and David cousins, and Ruari and Ben sort of second cousins.

Yes, but without any actual blood connection.

Did Jenny ever adopt Ruari, or just do all the mothering anyway?

Did all the mothering, didn't need to adopt since he was domiciled with his only living parent.

JD has been an amazing 'mother' to Ruairi.

I

Yes I thought Brian's 'we've done a good job with Ruari' needed a postscript of 'well, mostly you Jennydarling' .

Either that or "which is more than has been possible with any of yours."

I had to apologise to someone I was on the phone to this week that the reason he couldn't hear me was that a lorry was passing and he was on hands free... as I was riding my horse down the road 😕

I could have so easily done a Shula.

@texasss

I had to apologise to someone I was on the phone to this week that the reason he couldn't hear me was that a lorry was passing and he was on hands free... as I was riding my horse down the road 😕

I could have so easily done a Shula.

Well, she was on a bridle-path rather than on a road, so less likely to encounter a lorry I suppose.

I just get the feeling she may not have been giving her full attention to the horse, which she'd already noticed was restive about something before the dramatic cry and the all-fall-down.

I feel for you @WheresThatCatGoneNow, about 40 years ago a male friend of mine told me he fancied me, I told him I was Boringly Straight. We were still friends until he died. Sadly it appears homophobia is now back in fashion.

Oh dear, good job I got a new username.

I feel sick

@WhoppingBigBackside

I feel sick

It could be worse. Someone fancying Shula would be worse.

Poor old Alistair. How could Shula do that to him? I know it's because Shula is Shula.

There's no need for that @MereDintofPandiculation
Poor Alistair

Well, she said she’d ditched Alastair because she wanted more excitement in her life. Carrying on a clandestine affair with a married man while training to be a vicar should do the job.

I have sympathy with her at all.

I've said it all along. Beware the newly-single female friend.

I hate the scriptwriters right now.

I meant "I have no sympathy with her at all". But you would have expected no less of me.

Beware the newly-single female friend. I think that's a bit unfair. It's been Neil throwing himself at her, not the other way round.

That is how it works.

Your friend or your OH's friend splits up with her OH, and he's in there like a rat down a drainpipe.

It's the other way round if you split up with your OH, one of your single acquaintances will make a beeline for him.

Not every time but I have seen it enough time to understand that there's a pattern.

Poor Neil. I hope Susan has a chilli on the go.

It's the other way round if you split up with your OH, one of your single acquaintances will make a beeline for him. Does that happen in happy marriages? Is it true what they used to tell us, that the poor dears can't help themselves?

Beware the newly-single female friend

She's not newly single though? They split up ages ago.

@WhoppingBigBackside

That is how it works.

Your friend or your OH's friend splits up with her OH, and he's in there like a rat down a drainpipe.

It's the other way round if you split up with your OH, one of your single acquaintances will make a beeline for him.

Not every time but I have seen it enough time to understand that there's a pattern.

Eh? Never seen anything like this. 😀 you live in a strange place!