🏏Archers thread #136: Howzat! Oliver’s bowled a googly, Kathy’s out, Grey Gables left with nightwatchman. Tracy knocked for six. Is Ambridge on a sticky wicket? 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 are entranced by new character Adil, 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 if anybody made a thread title suggestion and I missed it. I decided to mark the start of the cricket season in the hope that things will take a turn for the better for poor Tracy.

It feels like months since the last new thread, which was just after Phoebe departed for Scotland. Has she been mentioned since? I can't recall. Not greatly missed, by me, at any rate. Her fish gifts didn't last long.

I can't shake off the feeling that The Archers is going through a long dull patch. I don't feel greatly engaged by anything that's happening at the moment other than Tracy's plight. Such a good actor, which helps, of course.

What's keeping you listening? Habit? Genuinely enjoying it? Over to you!

(PS In the process of starting this thread, I've discovered that our custom-made Archers emoji has gone. You used to get it by typing . Not any more.)

Is the trillion quid bet Freddie and Lily made ever going to be mentioned again?

Talking of twins Tom and Natasha should definitely name theirs in honour of the grandparents: Pony and Tat.

Can someone remind me what the trillion quid bet was about please.

Something struck me tonight about the dialogue between Natasha/Tom/Helen - do any of the couples call each other by any form of ‘pet’ name? [I hate that term] or I mean any kind of short hand intimacy that couples adopt? Or even close friends etc I suppose. It just seemed very forced that Tom KEEPS saying ‘Natasha’ as opposed to something else when he wanted her attention (ie I can imagine them saying ‘babe’ or something similar and that fitting well with their characters, when he’s passing her forks or whatever it was they were doing in that scene while laying the table).
obvs we have ‘Jenny darling’, and I have vague memories of Rob using various romantic pet names for Helen (and I feel like maybe Russ does this too with Lily?) but I can’t think of any other regular, natural sounding uses of that kind.
which leads me to think, is it some kind of class signifier here? Obvs as it’s radio we often NEED to know who is being referred to so we do tend to hear peoples’ name used much more than in real life, but in that mozzarella 3 hander it seemed really forced and unnatural.

I know after the garbage last week that we should be grateful for tonight's episode but Tom, Natasha, Pat and Helen's delivery of dialogue is so wooden and laboured.

Ugh at Pat being all jealous over Natasha having the temerity to want her mother after having a caesarean for twins! She had the face on before when Tom and Natasha dared to visit them. Ridiculous woman. I’m the same age (ish) as Tom and Natasha so obviously wasn’t listening at the time, but I can’t imagine Pat was up there on the list of nominees for the maternal goddess/loving mother of the year award when her three were tiny.

Tiger and Puss Cat.

I once visited a water buffalo farm where they made mozzarella. My abiding memory is that it was incredibly smelly, so I'm not sure how welcome it would be in Ambridge in reality.

Yes you'd think Tash, Hel etc at the least wouldn't you?

Yes I desperately want Russ's ending to be FITTING!

I think part of the pet name problem is the SLs always have to identify who's speaking for the benefit of listeners. It's one the non-RL tropes of radio. Like the abnormal amount of cake eaten in Ambridge and its environs, and no-one using mobiles to talk to each other. And so very few with ongoing health concerns, e.g. must make sure I get my prescription filled, especially when you consider the age of so many of the characters.

Is there a chemist in Ambridge or do they go to Borchester?

There isn't a pharmacy in Ambridge AFAIK. There would be no need for one as hardly anyone ever gets ill

@echt yes absolutely, I’m not querying the need for more signifiers and recognise that the radio format necessitates some non-RL stuff, it doesn’t usually bother me. It just struck me as heavily false and awkward in that particular scene, as the characters had all been established and dont sound anything like one another, so there wasn’t any need for us as the audience to have non-RL guidance on who was who. as @JanglyBeads says, you’d think there was more shortening of names, or calling one another by affectionate nick names etc. Even with friends and family - I’m now thinking that maybe Tracey has called Chelsea something more familiar in the past, although can’t recall what, so maybe my classist/dramatic effect theory doesn’t hold ground. But wrt last nights episode , with no particular need in that scene to establish characters it just struck me as laconic writing; it was like they hadn’t ever met before, let alone having twins together!

Listening to yesterday's omnibus was excruciating. A whole hour of annoyance.

Such an interesting point about naming! I’m sure Tracey does call her daughter “Chels” when they’re chatting and I’m sure I’ve heard her being called “Trace” - by jazzer?

Funny to imagine maybe the scriptwriters do think that only people in council houses do abbreviations. Although come to think of it Phoebe has been “Phoebs” to her dad too hasn’t she. Sooooo…. Just not posh people doing it then. It’s like they’ve never heard of alll the Pongos and Bungos and Flisses that occupy our private schools.

the Pat and Tony family always address each other in full (I guess Pat and Tony are abbreviations but they never vary the names) and it always sounds awful! I can’t remember the last time my mum addressed me by my full first name yet “Hellin” is always “Hellin” and never “Hels”, “Helly, “my love” or even “stinky” or whatever her brothers would have called her growing up. Same with Natasha.

Think Freddie said he could fully manage Lower Loxley successfully in x years and Lily just pissed herself at his claim. Therefore he made the very grown up decision to make a £1 million bet with her.

@EnterACloud yes yes to Tom and Helen calling each other ‘stinky’ while sitting down to one of Pat’s Sunday dinners 😂

I don't understand the need for nn. I'm usually called by name.
Mince and Iris call people 'bab', Lillian calls everyone 'dahling'

IRL, if someone calls me darling I ask them not to. I find it patronising

@EnterACloud and you’re right - we do have Chels, Trace, Pheebs etc. And even Jazzer, Pip etc I suppose is a shortening too. Which makes it even odder that the Bridge Farm lot are so formal - are we meant to just think that this is how they are?

I have a name with a million possible abbreviations/variants, all of which I loathe and won't answer to. They're fine on other people but not on me. My daugher (different name, same issue) has also refused to be addressed by anything other than her full first name. Maybe Natasha is the same.

Kenton calls his little brother David 'Dave'. Nobody else does and he does it in spite of/because of David's outrage. That's always struck me as a good bit of writing.

Did anybody other than Nigel call Elizabeth Lizzie?

Pip has been Pip since she was born, but she's Philippa on the birth certificate.

Jazzer is Jack but nobody in Ambridge calls him that. Wonder what his family call him.

Bridge Farm are actually addicted to short names. Pat, Tony, John, Tom, Lee, Jack. Helen is so short it's surely not often given a pet form. Johnnie is called that to differentiate him from his father. Henry is probably like my daughter and me and won't answer to anything else. Good on him. I have high hopes of Henry turning out to be a monster in a few years. Rob's early training must have had an effect.

PS Nice to hear some cricket-related stuff again as the thread finally draws to a close.

Ha! Yes I forgot about “Dave”.

that’s it - it’s less about having an abbreviated name day to day like Tony who I presume is Anthony. It’s about pet names, variations, nicknames. Eg I think David called Pip something like “pipsqueak” for about 5 minutes 20 years ago.

Sorry just to go back to Russ, I’m amazed Chelsea (and Tracey) are so relaxed around him. EVERYONE in my town knew who the “paedo” teachers were and that included the ones who got together with students who were over 16 or “after they’d left school” as well as convicted sex offenders.

Once again I give thanks that I went to a girls' school with an all-female teaching staff.

Well quite.

Although there weren't that many of them (known), which was one reason why it was so easy to know who they were.

Pretty gross when your recent school leaver friend introduces you to her boyfriend "John" and you look up to see it's actually "Mr Cooper"

Em
Lyndy

That’s all that come to mind. I think Brian is the type of man to call every woman he’s shagging “darling” so that he doesn’t catch himself out. (Love Brian!)