Archers thread #143: In the Bleak Midwinter, Ambridge Folk Make Moan. Best Christmas ever? Probably not! 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, although we do mostly try to be civil about it. Most of us are posting tongue in cheek a lot of the time, so don't worry about revealing that you'd love to be in Jolene's choir , 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/4636789-the-archers-spoilers-thread-7-cant-wait-for-702pm-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.)

Well, we made it through Stir Up Sunday without bloodshed, but poor Ben is now in the grip of psychotic depression. Not going to be a happy Christmas at Brookfield, sadly. When will Jill swallow her pride and go and give him the abject apology he deserves? Would it be a good idea anyway for Ben to see his gran at the moment?

Will Jazzer say yes? I hope so. We could do with a Horrobin wedding to look forward to.

Will Emma and Ed end up in court if they go ahead with this idiotic scheme to nick the logs from Peggy's Folly?

Will the two choirs put on a joint concert at Christmas? I assume so, and also that the BBC will continue to fool nobody by using recordings of what is clearly a really good well-rehearsed established choir, not a scratch choir of half a dozen novices.

Over to you!

Er you do know this is a drama? (Am avoiding the S O term!) That scene opened an episode, with no lead up, they were miles away from Ambridge, and no one else knew it was happening.

Will eat Justin's deerstalker if them knowing each other doesn't turn out to be significant!

Radio Carter just could not get over the fact that she was not first with news and that this was news concerning her own sister! She was literally dumfounded as she had no inkling. And that's a situation that is likely to be repeated because now Tracy has found her soulmate in Jazzer (and there's no doubt he has been brilliant over the whole Chelsea pregnancy business), it is Jazzer who who will be her first port of call in any future confidences. I think Susan's reaction was this fact dawning on her.

@LillianGish yes maybe! You see this is the aspect of TA I love - the ordinary family dynamics, some dramatic storylines as in life itself, but all rooted in the dynamic. It fascinates me!

(Sorry about punctuation/ grammar. Barely keeping my eyes open)

Susan's nose was massively out of joint.

She likes to be first with any gossip, so there was that.

Here, not only was she last to find out, from an unrelated customer , but Tracy and Jazzer got engaged in front of half of Ambridge and Tracy is her own sister! She's always been able to pull rank from being the older sister and having made more of a success of her life than Tracy (largely through marriage, of course). I heard it as Susan not being at all pleased that so much attention and affection had been showered on T&J with nobody thinking or saying 'But where is Susan?'

She has no grounds whatsoever to feel, far less say, that Tracy could do better. Her own daughter Emma is married to Ed Grundy, who is Jazzer's best friend and has no more going for him than Jazzer has. Arguable, even less, as Jazzer has a fairly secure full-time permanent job, and Ed makes a precarious living from assorted freelance enterprises, and lives in a mobile home as he and Em couldn't afford to buy a house or even rent one.

I'm on Team Stella. I like Stella. She is a manager on presumably quite a high salary. Brian needs to let go and trust her to manage her own time and cover for any absences. It's his own fault if he hasn't been reviewing the shared calendar.

Bit worried about Jennifer, though. Nearly a year since we last heard her speak, IIRC what Asking checked for us recently! I do hope Angela Piper is OK.

It's all about the family dynamics for me - it's about taking time to get to know the characters and then seeing how they interact and what knocks them off their stride. That's why I hate it when they are forced to act out of character for the sake of generating "drama". Jill' outburst at Ben (always her favourite) was a case in point and I'm finding George's recasting as the devil incarnate hard to engage with.

They do sometimes leave a promising storyline just hanging. I dimly recall an episode where Siobhan and Brian were together during the period where their affair was still secret. She may have been pregnant with Ruairi. They went to a shop or a market and he bought her a blue vase. The regulars on the BBC Archers Messageboard (ye olde Mustardland) were all convinced this vase would turn out to be significant. Nope! Never mentioned again.

They do sometimes leave a promising storyline just hanging - the sinkhole being a case in point.

Yes! So many promising candidates to fall down it ...

That conversation between Pip and new old friend...

Where is this revived friendship leading Pip???

(Yes, I know I shouldn't feel )

was I dreaming? did I hear the word 'vulva' on the Archers?
well may Pip sound sheepish, women being coy about naming their genitals do their daughters no favours.

Re Ruari, I am picturing Paul as blonde, fair skin, maybe a few freckles, fit and well toned without being grossly muscley, well groomed, with a sense of fun and a good heart, so he will do very nicely as a simple country lad.

I agree with the second half of your description of Paul but unless his dad is white and has incredibly strong genes, with Denise (who’s black) as his mum I doubt he’s very pale and freckly.

oops, forgot about that. OK, he has olive skin, brown eyes, thick black hair that is wavy but not tight curls, he still has freckles though. On his nose.

Meghan Markle has freckles, I think?

It especially doesn’t make sense that Pip would be all coy about ‘vulva’ when David said it recently too - and, well, that she’s a farmer who just referred to a birthing cow!

I could have done without David’s ‘vulva’ (sorry!) though. I bet the actor looked twice at that script. I think today’s scriptwriter is also likely a MNetter given the point about vagina vs vulva, so 👋🏻😂

I’m going for lesbian love triangle with Stella. Pip will be overrun with vulvas 😆

Ph yes we had vulva unexpectedly a couple of months ago, didn't we? Are they doing it for a bet or something?!?!

*Oh

I’m betting on Susan next, I can just hear her saying it in her dulcet tones. Or maybe Ruairi.

Really ill advised Affair between the new friend and ben?

I think the new friend is a MNer, what is her username do we think?

i love the idea of them doing it for a bet!

Haven’t listened to tonight’s yet, so I hope they weren’t discussing Pip’s vulva 😬.

Poor Susan, just a short time ago she was related by marriage to The Aldridges, now it’s Jazzer. Is it that she doesn’t think he’s good enough and they won’t go the distance? She’s never taken them seriously. Also, BOOP for a casual mention of covid! Sounds like T and J both had it (and probably the whole household).

He wasn't being lectured. He was trying to tell Stella that she didn't have permission to organise her own diary and to cancel a planned trip to an important event for the farm. It was important to her that they establish what the parameters were and why he was so bothered about something that was a pretty normal part of her job.

I think Susan has a tiny little bit of a point.
Tracey got engaged in The Bull in front of half the village.
But instead of phoning her sister Susan at 8am on New Years Day, she waited until the 2nd to wander into the shop to tell her, by which time she already knew.

I think Pip's new friend will get her off the farm, dating. She needs to meet people somehow and needs a catalyst for it.

Oooh I think Lottie is a Mumsnet user with her biological terms!

My maternal cousin (two Black parents) has freckles and reddish hair. Mum’s family is Jamaican but her maiden name is Scottish and we assume linked to Scottish sailors, plantation owners or the Scottish criminals who were exiled to Jamaica in the 1700s. Every now and again someone in her family is born with the freckles and red hair - it’s a complete lottery though!