🧦 Archers thread #133: Woolley socks it to them! Discuss The Archers and its Woolley thinking and plotting here.

[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 would love to take part in the Mysteries, 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 @ButtonSister and @BorsetshireBanality for title suggestions. I went with their idea in the interests of keeping the title fairly short.

@LillianGish and @FoxgloveSummers made cracking but longer suggestions, which (mashed up) will do a great job of kicking off our new thread.

Evictions (Tom and Tash), depictions (Bridge Farm Christmas card), conniptions (entire cast and crew of the Mysteries), convictions (Philip) and addictions (Alice) - what are our predictions for 2022 in Ambridge? All sure to make this the Best Ambridge Christmas Evah!

This thread should take us through to early January unless something very exciting happens (ha ha, fat chance). My predictions: this is a bit left field, but I wonder if Peggy will offer to buy the shop and flat so Tom and Gnasher (great coinage, whose was it?) can stay put. I don't believe Hazel is sincere about wanting to live in/regularly visit Ambridge. She's always been utterly two-faced and rotten to the core, why would she change now?

The Mysteries will, of course be a triumph and briefly borrowing the🔮 (sorry, Bore!) I expect we are going to hear them at some point over the New Year period.

Over to you!

I really cannot remember Alice telling Chris that she wanted a divorce, not in so many words. After she got back from rehab she told him she wouldn't be moving back in, but I think it was in a way that made it sound as if that sentence ended "at the moment" or "until I have sorted myself out", rather than "ever". Ten days later she told her parents that she and Chris were getting divorced and that it had been her idea and Chris was shocked but ok with it, but I really don't remember her telling Chris that before she told them.

My own feeling is that she would like him and Martha just to stay in stasis for her benefit until she feels up to having a relationship with either of them, which might be this year, next year, some time, never. They ought to be happy to await her pleasure, since she cannot simply turn them off at the wall until she feels like turning them on again.

(As I remember the book, Cassandra was perfectly well aware that Stephen fancied her rotten; she just didn't fancy him back, so she felt ever-so-slightly guilty about using him as a servant and basking in his adoration, while thinking of him as a servant and therefore Not Suitable and accepting his help. Also he copied out poems to give her instead of writing them himself, the clod! -- Caveat, I haven't read it for thirty years so might have the detail wrong. You might be right about the resemblance, though. Alice is now finding Chris a liability and wants him to leave her alone because she feels just slightly awkward about the way she has treated him and is aware that the flow of generosity has all been one way.)

(Memo to self: put I Capture the Castle into the bookshelf by the bed to re-read. Take out Dave Egger's What is the What and put it in the main shelves, I am clearly not going to get round to it at the moment.)

I'm pretty sure Alice told him that their marriage was over

@AskingQuestionsAllTheTime

Sorry, missed bit.

I'm fairly sure she did say the marriage was over, more than once. She just didn't bother to mention it to her husband. That was why Brain got into a panic about what the settlement might be in her divorce.

You can't blame Chris for not realising then. She certainly seemed surprised when he said he wanted a divorce. Perhaps she wanted him hanging around in case she changed her mind.

@WhoppingBigBackside

I'm pretty sure Alice told him that their marriage was over

What Alice said (having gone and checked) was after he had showed her the memory box of Martha's time without her which he had carefully made so Alice would feel she hadn't been forgotten, and after he had asked her to come home to be with him and Martha again. She said she couldn't.

He said he didn't get it, and she said "I love you, Chris. Believe me, I do. But ... I can't come back." He asked why not, and she said, "I told you," and he replied, "Then you'll have to spell it out for me, Alice, because I'm not understanding this." And she explained: "When things were really bad, you took Martha away from me. You were right to do that. You did what had to be done, not only for Martha's sake but for your own." And he said that "things are better now" and she said "You act like it's all over" (he said "No, I don't", which she ignored) "Well, it isn't. I still need help." (And he said yes, she did.) "And I will try to get that help." (He said that he wanted to help her.) "I can get support from the doctor, from Lisa, from detox, from the rehab centre..." (and he said "but not from your own family?") "Look, this box, Martha's Memories -- what's missing from it? What's missing? What's not there? All these memories of our little girl growing up, and I'm not in them, am I? Because that's how it had to be. You got by without me, Chris: you managed. Now that's what I have to do." (He asked rather desperately, "Without help?") "Without you. That's what I'm trying to tell you. I have to do this on my own. I can't be with you any more."

In the context, and bearing in mind what went before it, that to me is not exactly an intention to go and apply for a divorce: after all, Chris was not left without her for more than about eight months. She didn't bother to mention a little detail like "I need us to get a divorce" to him; only to her parents, who spread it all round the village. I expect someone told Chris eventually.

You’re right about the book I think Asking. Except she does sort of fancy him because he’s utterly gorgeous but not in a “want to be with him” sort of way. So yes she feels bad about “going for a walk with him” to soothe her own feelings and leading him on. There’s a sad bit near the end of the book about everyone being in love with the wrong person like a sort of weird game/fairground ride ir something. I love Stephen and thought he had a rubbish time and thought Cassandra’s taste in men was utterly bloody.

I think Amy did a great job supporting Alice. I'm glad Alice was able to tell her mum she needed to go back to work.

Does Amy have to have supervised contact with Martha? Couldn't she do with some help with bonding?

Something I’ve been noticing about TA is that they let us in on big events, they tell us that they’ve happened, eg, we don’t hear the gathering around Natasha and looking after and hearing her say where she’s hurt, we hear a scream off, and a post event conversation between Tom and Pat. Has it always been like this or is it just the last few years?

@Whatifitallgoesright

Does Amy have to have supervised contact with Martha? Couldn't she do with some help with bonding?

Did you mean Amy?

@MereDintofPandiculation

Something I’ve been noticing about TA is that they let us in on big events, they tell us that they’ve happened, eg, we don’t hear the gathering around Natasha and looking after and hearing her say where she’s hurt, we hear a scream off, and a post event conversation between Tom and Pat. Has it always been like this or is it just the last few years?

Always been like this. It's a technique for radio drama.

I'm pleased Stella said "no"

Tom and Gnasher are insufferable. Pat will be blamed if Gnasher is injured.

Who on earth thinks a wall mounted bathroom cabinet is a suitable 70th birthday present?

I'm pleased Pat spoke out about the bath and candles nonsense.

You can't blame Chris for not realising then. She certainly seemed surprised when he said he wanted a divorce. Perhaps she wanted him hanging around in case she changed her mind

I can't bear the thought of re-listening to Alish's wittering but like Chris I was surprised that she was surprised.

I thought the cabinet "present" was genius on the part of the SWs, just the kind of thoughtless thing Tom and Gnasher do, exacerbated by Tom's mystification, and a harbinger of worse to come. And the tidying away of Pat and Tony's things; spot-on for showing the way in which they are being pushed out of visibly living in their home.

If I have guests over for any length of time, I clear a drawer in the cabinet for their things so they don't have to carry toilet bags around, but also because the bathroom is "family". P&T are being reduced to guest status.

I thought the cabinet "present" was genius on the part of the SWs

Wasn't it just?

That was a good episode tonight.

How did they manage when Helen lived there with two young children?

KimikosNightmare
I'm pleased Stella said "no"

Pity she was then persuaded to change her mind.

What I really don't understand is why Alice is so desperate to get an unpaid job on Home Farm.

After their ride, Lilian was congratulating Alice on how well she was training the horse she'd been riding; if she is working at the Stables training horses, why on earth does she need a part-time-temporary job anywhere else?

Pity she was then persuaded to change her mind

Yes, but at least she insisted it would be on a voluntary, unpaid basis and for much less hours than Alish wanted.

Always been like this. It's a technique for radio drama. Irritates me no end. I think because it makes the mechanics of the writing so obvious

Please let the ‘job’ be cleaning the office! (Purely for the lols.)

It’s always so stressful listening to Tom. And surely (in the absence of pandemic complications) Pat and Tony would be on their way to somewhere two days flight away, for a very, very long and luxurious birthday holiday.

Ideally Alice would get a job at the stables but perhaps this gives her the chance to get to know Stella, for plot purposes.

I dont mean to be mean (I've had 6 miscarriages) but would the hospital really be interested that she'd had a knock? If there's no bleeding? Do we think we'll find there's no baby? Or there's a complication?

Poor Pat. Whatever the outcome, she will now be made to feel guilty for the rest of her life for Natasha’s fall. I feel so sorry for her. I find it impossible when I have guests staying who fail to read the cues that you expect them to go out occasionally or leave.

Alice doing some volunteering is exactly what she needs. It’s not exactly volunteering as she is a shareholder herself and it’s the family farm but it should do her the world of good - of course we know it probably won’t…

Didn't Batasha trip over the tools Tom had left n the hall?

I'd be furious if I was Pat. If I wanted a new bathroom cabinet I'd want to choose it

I have some sympathy for Tom after Kirsty lost their baby, and he’s got a lot of other baggage (losing his brother, witnessing his sister be so badly abused).