🏘️ 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!

Hmm.
It's not Shula, it's the scriptwriters.

The fox hunt story died a death because foxes is cute innit.

But the Hunt Master thing happened long after foxes were taken out of the equation (in England, at least). She was only Master of a bunch of people who liked to dress up and race around the countryside ...

Shula doesn’t really have hobbies or interests except “being admired” which would explain why she wants to be a vicar, why she became hunt master, and why she’s taking a belated shine to Neil.

On a separate note, as if Jill would have let her freshly broken daughter sit there unfed - I reckon the fridge was crammed full of lovingly made meals. Or Elizabeth would have insisted Shula come and stay in her fucking great pile with a chef on hand.

True, Foxglove!

I'm pretty sure clergy aren't allowed to ride to hounds, traditionally. They can still go beagling etc of course.

Gosh this writing is woeful: Shula behaving like a petulant toddler to Neil; Shula confusing Alistair; Neil's lasagne; everyone thinking that a serious alcoholic would be helped by a visit to the vicar's midwife daughter....

It's like reading " that happened", that subreddit of things people claimed on social media happened to them, but clearly didn't. The plots have lost credibility within their own world.

The Parson Jack Russell was a fox hunting terrier.

@WhoppingBigBackside

The Parson Jack Russell was a fox hunting terrier.

But not, I think, actually ordained

Neither is Shula.

I can't bear to listen again, but I took Shula to mean she had had one of those slow-mo moments as she fell off the horse, where you think "this could be it." Although thinking about it now, did she tell Alastair it took place after she had fallen?

As a very experienced rider, she will have had a fair few falls, and will know the best way to fall, so my slo-mo theory fails.

Why am I even trying to make sense of it?

Shula needs to go and do a pilgrimage (Camino de Santiago will do).

I knew someone who did that by horseback. Or ponyback.

@Terhou

Why were JD and Brine needed to babysit when Ruari was at home anyway?

That wasn't the odd part. Ruari is 18- I'm not sure many teenagers who aren't the actual parent of a baby would want to be left in sole charge of it. And even if he were comfortable with that , he doesn't need a particular reason for Brine and JD to be there.

The odd part was why were Adam and Ian both out? Were they on a date? Have they kissed and made up? Aren't they broke? Or imminently broke?

There are plenty of things you can do that don't cost any money.

Thing is that Neil and Shula really do care about each other and always have. They have been very ‘safe’ people to talk to when either has been in a crisis.

But I don’t want to see Neil’s world imploding.

I can see them having a very adult responsible discussion about it and choosing not to wreck marriages. Then Shula can go in her pilgrimage and Dan can run the stables and Alice can come back and set up an equine therapy centre for recovering alcoholics.

Did we ever figure out the significance of the bridle bag?

Having just listened on catch up I really don't think the real Shula would have confided her Neil front to her exH - perhaps to Elizabeth or Jill but not to Alistair - if it had been a new man that she hadn't known for years and all are friends with then perhaps she at a push will have told Al but not told him about Neil - sloppy scriptwriters

FlosCampi
I'm pretty sure clergy aren't allowed to ride to hounds, traditionally.

When are you thinking about? Any time before WWI, the local parson was quite likely to ride to hounds. It turns up in various literature of the nineteenth century.

They still are allowed to ride to hounds in dioceses which say they have "a neutral stance" on the matter. I don't think Hereford has yet defrocked or whatever it is called the vicar there who was riding to hounds in 2016, for instance. He may even be the person who decided Shula is suitable for the ministry! "The Diocesan Director of Vocations & Ordinands, (his name), meets with prospective candidates and oversees the process." Ambridge might be in the Herefordshire diocese...

Also, can I just ask do people IRL ever have a realisation moment, when it dawns on them they are in love with someone they have known for ages? Happened to me.

And if she was so in love with Neil why did she object to him changing her damp sling? Because her strong Christian principles told her he was forbidden fruit. Just because the outside world wouldn't disapprove doesn't stop her knowing what is in her mind.

Ambridge might be in the Herefordshire diocese... Only if Hereford has taken over Felpersham and/or Worcester in a coup.

I'm afraid I am of the same school of thought as HRH Chas.

Whatever in love means.

Apart from DCat.

That was 40 years 6 months ago!

@MereDintofPandiculation

Ambridge might be in the Herefordshire diocese... Only if Hereford has taken over Felpersham and/or Worcester in a coup.

I know, but this is The Archers, so anything is possible. We don't really know where Ambridge is meant to be, after all; we only guess at Inkberrow because bits of Ambridge were modelled on that place. I wouldn't put it past Them to have decided the place is in Oxfordshire diocese.

It turns up in various literature of the nineteenth century
It's certainly a divisive issue among the Barsetshire clergy.

@theThreeofWeevils

It turns up in various literature of the nineteenth century It's certainly a divisive issue among the Barsetshire clergy.

Which brings us neatly back to Ambridge, in the county of Borsetshire -- surely the name has been slightly eroded by time?

Ambridge might be in the Herefordshire diocese

Definitely Felpersham, not Hereford.