Archers thread #146: They did fall apart. Can they put themselves together again? 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, and of course we are always delighted to welcome back former or occasional listeners/posters. 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 like to donate your time as a guide at Lower Loxley to save the Pargetters paying someone else a living wage, 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.)

Thanks to @Impostersyndrome for the thread title suggestion Buses and trains are sorely lacking, canals might be nearby, but all roads lead to Ambridge, picking up on transport discussions in the last thread. In the end I didn't use it, having in mind the character limit. @TottersBlankly contributed an early draft title Wreathes, wrath, writhing (Jennifer, Lilian, Ruairi). Both good starting points for the new thread, which I hope will last till Jennifer's funeral, surely not too far off now. So, over to you - whither the Aldridges? Also, does anyone care if Lee goes to the US? Is anyone even slightly interested in the Brookfield B&B venture?

Some b&bs with shared bathrooms near Ambridge

au.bluepillow.com/accommodations/double-room-with-shared-bathroom-upton-upon-severn
www.expedia.co.uk/Worcester-Hotels-Shrubbery-Guest-House.h24208604.Hotel-Information
www.kyre-equestrian.co.uk/bed-and-breakfast/
www.orchardsidehanleyswan.co.uk/
uk.hotels.com/ho680048800/the-rag-house-worcester-united-kingdom/

They’re not hard to find.

Admittedly most are sharing with another guest, sharing with the famiky is especially gruesome.

Lynda’s doing her job so well, though, isn’t she?

Definitely - I bet any B&B owner would recognise those requests and comments. Lynda was right - when people want a rural idyll on holiday they generally want the holiday version. Clean, well equipped and with good facilities. Not 'make do and mend' and sharing one bathroom with the family.

David really is a plonker with his insistence that he knows best.

I haven’t posted for ages as I tend to listen at intermittent times but @C8H10N4O2 I very much enjoyed and agreed with your commentary in the last couple of pages of posts.

I throughly agree that the Brookfield side tonight was basically comedic but as@MereDintofPandiculation said, implausible as the situation was, it was fabulous seeing Lynda being Lynda.

And oh gosh - Brian and the dinner with Kirsty and Roy tonight. That’s exactly what my dad would have done - Brian and him are nothing alike at all with regard to temperament, occupation, general life etc, aside from age - but out of all the post-Jenny episodes that struck home for me about how he would have coped with that kind of situation, and I enjoyed the gentle support from Alice and Roy and Kirsty. It felt like a very realistic snapshot of how a man that age might act in the micro moments in the script - I think a good job tonight

I hope Lynda's advice is that if David stripping off in the kitchen is unavoidable during lambing season, they then should forget opening the B&B until lambing is well and truly over.

Calving

Or that they should officially request the B&B guests to stay in the part of the house which has been given over to them (bedroom, bathroom and dining-room) and not walk into the bits which are reserved for the family to use (kitchen, other bedrooms, living-room). Or fit Yale locks to prevent unwanted intrusions.

I've staying in many B&Bs over the years and all over the continent of Europe, and would never have dreamed of intruding into the areas of the house which were clearly not for guests.

Come to think of it, it sounded as if Lynda walked into the kitchen when she arrived. Not typical of a B&B guest, I wouldn't have thought; is there no front door, with a bell?

They should market it as an "immersive experience".
Hose them down in the yard, sleeping on hay bales etc.

Agreed.

@Xol I wonder if Graham Seed would be up for playing Robert? I reckon he could do the voice quite well.

@Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g my dad was also a huge TP fan so I’m blushing right now on two levels 😊

@leftshark thank you for the kind words, I also drift in and out of these threads. I consider @Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g is the heroine of these threads, ensuring a new thread with a snappy title even with a broken hand!

I liked last night's episode - felt much more "right" than some of the aftermath stories recently.

I can see Ben getting very frustrated with David's amateur approach to the B&B. Its almost as if David is trying to prevent it from being a success.

It's really rude for a B&B guest to walk in through the back door in the first place and then to go into the kitchen uninvited. Every B&B I have been in has a PRIVATE sign on the doors to the kitchen and family areas and a bell for attention. The Dopey's B&B sounds grim though.

But if there isn't a private sign, how are they to know...

I freely admit that I'm not the most houseproud of people, and take my grandma's old-fashioned view that you have to eat a peck of dirt before you die (I've always assumed "peck" meant 2 gallons, rather than a sparrow-sized peck), but there's something about that place that sounds properly grim. I picture the kitchen littered with empty frozen pizza boxes and dog-hair.

When I've been in a B&B, I would work on the basis that I certainly couldn't go past closed doors unless they had signs on indicating that they were for guest use (e.g. "Dining Room" or "Breakfast Room") or unless I'd been told they were for guest use. The Dopeys are probably in the habit of leaving the kitchen door open, so if a guest needs to speak to them it would be natural to follow the sound of their voices and find them there. And, for all we know, they may tell guests that if they need to speak to them they will probably find someone in the kitchen.

the muck room is full of:

dog hair
mud
blood & muck stained rags and towels next to the washer which is running 24/7 during calving/lambing season
ceiling pulley full of clean washing drying

the rest of the house should be reasonably clean.

I also worry about food safety in a mixed space like that. don't they need yo have a certificate if they offer food?

plus they have the facilities at the barn. can't they use those?

Lynda ❤

"little better than a flophouse" (Lynda is that you?) 😆

Ambridge knit-bone fairy 💪

Love this thread.

Haven't quite finished last night's episode as "unfortunately" I got interrupted just as David was - it sounded like - topless washing a load of blood and goo off in the kitchen sink. Eurgh. I'm AMAZED that Jill hasn't put a stop to such unhygienic goings on and they've not done something really sensible like have a sink out in the sheds. In fact, they must do? or at least a tap and bucket???

I've been into a lot of farmhouse kitchens and the dairy ones all smell of muck, just a little bit. The arable ones generally just have a general air of mud being somewhere nearby. How could they not? When I've stayed in farm b&bs I stay well out of the kitchen but I thought Lynda was doing a cracking job as the kind of guest who just wanders around everywhere.

ON reflection I think last night's episode was sponsored by Cold Comfort Farm.

You may have struck on a clever marketing wheeze there. They could rename the place Cold Comfort Farm and offer the whole grim experience, starring Jill as Aunt Ada Doom.

I organise user testing as part of my job and we love 'lynda'
they help make the end product a lot better.

Well I just wouldn't do it.

All the farmers I've known wear boiler suit type overalls which, I assume, would leave clothing worn underneath relatively unscathed but I would also expect Brookfield to have, if not a downstairs shower, a utility/mud room for cleaning farmyard filth off before coming into the kitchen.

Genius. Josh as Seth. Pip as Reuben. Ben as Elfine. Jill is surely Judith. Bess as Aunt Ada Doom.

Parade the cows past as limbs drop off for the full experience.