🐠 Archers thread #135: An Everyday Story of Fishy Folk. Discuss The Archers 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 be delighted to be given a goldfish named after your ex, 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.)

Apologies for ignoring the various title suggestions on the last thread. However, here they are, plus a couple of other pithy observations, to kickstart the new thread. I think it's fair to say nobody is looking on this as a Golden Era! Goldfish Era, though ...

@Roysnewshirt: Everyone wants more! Chris wants more Amy; Jazzer wants more Tracey; Alice wants more time with Martha and Amy wants more space… Very true. And now we know Kirsty wants more farming expertise in the rewilding project, but not Pip (thank the lord) so does that mean approaching Adam? Currently under-employed.

@LillianGish: I tune in to hear birdsong and bleating in the English countryside not hammy acting and suggestive grunting.

@stilldumdedumming: Archers is good at the dynamics of family, farming, what it means to have your job, your home and your inheritance so closely aligned etc etc not this nonsense!

@DoctorTwo: Like fuck would Pheobe buy her parents a goldfish each. The Ambridge character transplant fairy has been working overtime this past few weeks, it's been absolutely fucking appalling bar a couple of exceptions.

Can't disagree with any of that. I want to hear more about the pigs and any other effects of Brexit. A topical insert about the war in Ukraine must surely be on the way.

Any happy listeners out there? Any disgruntled listeners with even more grumbles? Over to you!

Lily's not from Ambridge

She was a posh twin with a thirst for knowledge,
Screwed Deputy Head from sixth form college...

The years of visiting other people's offices for a few days at a time to do an audit have left a deeper mark than I realised ...

I still occasionally remember the proprietor of a business sitting down with a sales rep he'd known for years, while I was sitting quietly in a corner of his office reviewing purchase invoices. The false heartiness was something to behold. 'How the devil are you, old son?' one of them said to the other. Reader, I winced.

I'm surprised that Lily is so eager to recommend virtually anyone who asks her for a job. Surely it can't do her reputation with the company any good when they turn up and can't get through an interview?

Mind you, I don't understand why the SWs have left her flogging kitchens for so long anyway, surely she could have moved on to, well, virtually anything more fulfilling a long, long time ago.

An interesting thing I have found about kitchen designers/salespeople is that they invariably have very little interest in cooking itself.

Finder's Fee

She would have moved on, probably into something like events planning. The posh bit would have got her a foot in the door

I don't understand why Freddie is still a KP at GG

I don't understand why Freddie is still a KP at GG

He's not in a few days...

I don't get Susan and Neil using up so much of their savings to help pay for Christopher's fees ?

• surely Christopher has some money ?

&didn't Neil get a "huge" for the Carters pay rise when he went for the management job at Berrow ?

And didn’t he say his job possibilities were practically zero following his period of incarceration?

(Meant Freddie.)

Yes, given that Christopher has lived rent free for most of his married life and Alice was presumably contributing a hefty portion of the bills for much of that time, it's odd he can't scrape together enough to pay his solicitors without cleaning out his parents' savings. I wonder how he proposes to carry on paying them all the way through both financial and custody disputes?

Must admit, Clarrie's insistence on being busy for the sake of it whilst potentially aggravating her injury would seriously irritate me. To say nothing of her taking offence because other people can manage without her for a few days.

Must admit, Clarrie's insistence on being busy for the sake of it whilst potentially aggravating her injury would seriously irritate me

Clarrie was born to be a doormat. I could understand this response if she had been off work for six months but it’s barely been a few days.

Anyone got any views on tea loaves?

There's an interesting post on Academic Archers calculating Ian's likely redundancy payout at £27K, which would be a drop in the ocean in terms of buying out Alice's share of the farm. Indeed, I can't really see how it would fund Adam's idea of funding wonderful new opportunities, given that they were struggling financially even when Adam was on a full farm manager's income.

It could be, of course, that Adil's employers are planning to be extra generous, but (a) why would they given all the expenses of doing up the hotel, and (b) even if they double it it still doesn't help a whole lot with the buy-out.

Ian would have to be on crack to give up his redundancy payment - which is meant to tide you over until you can get back into work - to the Greater Glory of Adam's family farm. I mean, it's not exactly beyond the realms that Adam and Iain will divorce, given A is a cheating weasel. Then what.

No one in Ambridge has finances that make sense. V good question below about why Chris would be short of money. Say he's earning £30k a year as an experienced farrier, his outgoings are just living costs - he must have about £100k put away. Not like he's had to pay rent or a mortgage for many years.

I do feel like the Archers scriptwriters have this idea that if you were born "not posh" you're poor forever.

See also: Jazzer. No reason why he couldn't have got a half decent vocational qualification and be in heavy demand. Jim would probably loan him the money if he wanted to retrain.

I hope they take a different path with Tracey and get her training to be a plumber/hotel manager/mechanic and starts coining it in. It's VERY conservative of them to behave this way towards the non-Archers characters.

Jazzer does have his sheep shearing qualification, doesn’t he? (It wasn’t only Ed who’s qualified?) So he could presumably team up with someone else for that, now Ed’s resigned. It’s a skill, even if only seasonal.

Don’t know about Chris. Wasn’t he renting premises from the farrier he was apprenticed to, before he bought / took over / acquired the business and premises himself? I seem to recall it was a big leap and he and Alice were quite apprehensive about the financial commitment. Had he finished paying for that?

I guess Alice’s detox was a sizeable but manageable chunk of money. Really hard to say what Ambridge people spend their money on. No one travels further than the pub more than a couple of times a year, foreign holidays are extremely rare, they don’t buy ‘designer’ stuff, and most people have negligible housing costs.

Tea loaves - a speciality of my mother's. Very nice, especially buttered.

I find Tracy's financial difficulties a lot more credible than anyone else's. She's been living hand to mouth supporting two children with (presumably) no child support for a very long time. Bert is presumably in receipt of a pension and benefits to help with the rent (do pensioners get universal credit?). I'm not sure Gary is working, but if he is I don't get the impression he's capable of doing anything very well paid. With any luck, Chelsea will be earning soon, but I don't think junior hairdressers get much (or is she training to be a beautician? I forget).

Quote from Tracey last night:
"there's no way our Gary is going to wash his work clothes by hand"

Thanks, @Choccyp1g, I knew somebody would have been paying attention!

Didn't the sale of Alice's pony pay for at least a chunk of the detox? And I suspect Brine also had to cough up.

Sorry yes, I think Tracey, Emma and Ed's tricky finances make sense.

I don't think Chris "in demand rural worker who hasn't had to pay rent or a mortgage and had a rich wife and no kids til recently" being strapped for cash makes sense. I don't think Adam and Iain not having cash for the leccy bill makes sense. I don't think Brian and Jenny having money to splash on things but not bothering to buy another house makes sense. Who owns their house btw? The one they rent I mean.

A silent couple who were going away for a short time but having breathed the free air outside the Ambridge forcefield appear to have concluded they could never risk returning.

Another week over. I was wrong about Adam
Happy for Trazza

They dont
Emma and Ed left Brookfield as they couldn't pay the rent. They would have been eligible to tax credits and housing benefits.

Universal credit doesn't exist in Ambridge.

Emma went to the food bank, but I can't remember who referred her

I know that Neil & Susan have helped Meaned quite a lot, but they didn't when it came to the Beechwood House but they are helping Kristiffur with Marthyr and the legal fees