Archers thread #148: Unseasonably, it's panto time in Ambridge. He's behind you, Pat! BANG. 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 think George Grundy isn't a psychopath, 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.)

Will Rob return, or are they playing with us? Will Pat run amok with her shotgun and wipe out half the village? (We can but hope ...) Will Oliver come to his senses and turf the Grundy clan out of Grange Farm? So many questions, so much time.

Over to you!

I found the exchange between Tracey and Harrison so strange when they were talking about the 30 Days Wild initiative.
It sounded really unnatural to me. More like a public service announcement than anything else.

trees! I never look at trees! what even is a tree? why are trees?

Are there really adults so unaware of the world they live in?

Oh, it was definitely public service advertising. A more natural conversation would have been,
"I'm doing this 30 days wild thing with Jazzer. I think it's quite fun, but Jazzer's not convinced."
"What's that?"
" You do something every day connected with nature for 30 days."
"Like what?"
"FFS, Harrison, you're a policeman, you must know how to use Google. Look it up ÿourself."

Are there really adults so unaware of the world they live in?

Yes, there are. I have had colleagues who could distinguish between a tree and a flower, but that was about it. When I mentioned how I enjoyed the yellow flags being in flower by the pond, I got blank looks. "You know, the irises." Had to take him to the plant to show him. I didn't bother mentioning the loosestrife, forget-me-nots, water mint, etc.

To be fair, I am reasonably aware, but I haven't heard of 'yellow flags'.
I know more about wildlife than I do about plants, and also more about trees than flowers.

I felt as though the Eurovision nonsense was the same kind of thing, as well. Very odd, but too much of it seems to be weird guerilla advertising lately.

If not for the gender, I could be your colleague. I wish I knew plants and trees names. My grandad was encyclopaedic about them.

Quite!

I really liked Adil this week. They rounded him out a bit more as a person - a kind and thoughtful person, a private person (he didn’t mention his dead wife to Brian although it would have been not unnatural to bring it up in the context of their discussions about Jennifer), and a firm but fair and polite hand in business. I’d like to hear more of him.

Harrison sounded like he was stoned. I thought he’d get the munchies next.

Harrison seemed at a surprising loss given he has only very recently found God. I would have thought he would still be in the honeymoon period marvelling about God’s love given it can’t be more than 12 months since his baptism. Surely he must be preoccupied with Bible study each day - he doesn’t really have time to be looking for alternative initiatives to bring meaning to his life. Or perhaps the SWs have forgotten/decided to abandon his journey of religious discovery.

Maybe I’m a cynical person, but I felt that Adil was trying to get information out of Brian (to what end? I’m not sure) without giving anything away. I’m suspicious.

I rather thought it was kind of Adil not to mention his wife to Brian during their conversation.
I would like to hear more from him. He’s still something of an enigma at present.

"I've told you all this stuff about me, much of it personal and some of it business; I ought to shut up and stop boring on. Tell me about your story."
"I run Grey Gables, Brian: that about sums up my entire story at the moment."

I don't think I'd find that kind exactly; I think I'd find it a bit of a slap in the face, really.

I guess I’m too used to conversations of one-upmanship and liked that he didn’t try.

I also think as far as the SW are concerned that is Adil’s whole story at the moment.

Yes I didn't like that either.

I don't think it's entirely unexpected that Brian is slightly overflowing with (Brian style) emotion and open to talking. I like the conversation about the ferrets' outfits - it was very silly. I bloody love Charles Collingwood.

The only thing that really annoyed was the way Adil said "put them on the statue of a dog in Borchester" - the intonation was all wrong! "Chris Carter PUT them on a statue of a dog in BORCHESTER". Like the fact that it was a statue in Borchester was more interesting than the statue of a dog.

His Grey Gables line was the equivalent of saying ‘I’m a two-dimensional character, Brian, that about sums up my entire story at the moment.’

I thinking I were Brian and later found out he’d lost his wife too, I’d probably feel quite sad / awkward about the conversation.

Oh yes @WitcheryDivine , I'd forgotten that!

I agree with you too, @OverArmour .

Love the idea of the new GG owners being a consortium of all the evil people Ambridge has ever known!
(But I know it's just one of them)

The thing is, with The Archers, the owners could be a intriguing secret where we get to wonder and eventually find out along with whatever drama that creates, or, they might completely ignore all the signaling they’ve done in relation to this and we’ll never find out. Maybe the owners are The Gills so we can have silent owners of two of the main buildings 😂

As to the glasses, Jim would have kept his previous pair as a spare when he last got new ones.

I have millions of different pairs. Also I once got very drunk and left mine in a plant pot outside a friend's house, who I had drunkenly tried to drop in on. He was out, thankfully. But what was I thinking?

The Tracy/Harrison conversations confused me a bit. The first one was "do you want a pint" then he went away and came back for lunch - what the fuck time was she offering him a pint?

The Enigma That Is Adil is getting irritating now. The snippet about his wife was good. And I wonder if the Stella/Justin axis will lead to her having to stay because she knows where bodies are buried?

The denouement of this story is pathetic.

Very nasty to keep someone's glasses with corrective lenses 'to teach them a lesson'. Potentially dangerous to do it to an elderly person (though of course he'd have some slightly out-of-date pairs stashed away - and I assume he is responsible enough always to have a spare pair in the car, just in case). But still a spiteful, stupid and dangerous thing to do.

I very much agree that hiding someone's glasses is horrible behaviour and not something I would have expected of Susan until the past three or four editors.

I think that SL was written by someone who doesn’t wear glasses…

The glasses storyline was painful but Brian sacking Stella is worse. She's not going to go quietly.