Archers thread #151: A Fête worse than death or a reverse ferret? Helen’s got the Borsetshire Blues, Tom’s talking shiitake, George is a rotten apple. 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 Helen and Tom would do well on Dragons' Den, 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 @OverArmour for various title ideas! I would have liked to incorporate the suggestion from @Fleetress, which was

‘Do do one Ron, Ron, do do one Ron’

(Rob is Ron for many on this thread now)

Possibly a bit obscure for newer posters, though!

Anyway: we got through that last thread in no time at all. Combined effect of Rob and George, I suspect. I wonder if Rob will have made it to Ambridge by the time we need a new thread. I'm still waiting for Pat's shotgun to feature. That can't have been mentioned for the first time ever for no reason at all.

Over to you!

Amy too. I don't hold with the "one drop of blood" nonsense, according to which I suspect I am both black and Toltec as well as almost every other blood in Europe and the Americas apart from Basque, but Alan is her father and and her mother was black, which makes her as black as Noluthando and Sipho, and I have a feeling possibly as Paul too because we don;t know what his father's ethnicity was

@AskingQuestionsAllTheTime , I think it was you who is married to an Old Pauline. This is the type of post that made me comment that George Osborne didn't go to Eton. Previous thread?

"That's the key. You don't need to have gone to Eton but you probably need to have got in to e.g. Oxford and made the kind of connections that can help you lead a party."
That was on Page 2 | Do you think that this country will have a working class PM? | Mumsnet, about 3 pages in. (AndIKnewYouMeantIt 19:10 03/08/2023)

(Crikey I think that thread would probably make me explode)

I don't remember anything about Amy's mum - was she ever in the show?

Also didn't know about her ethnicity - I've always pictured Amy as a chubby pallid blonde.

Alan was a widower when he arrived in Ambridge, but Amy's grandmother visited regularly at one point and had several "comic" scenes with Usha's Aunty Satchia (sp?)

@JanglyBeads , it's quite amusing. Apparently Keir Starmer is MC because his father ran a business, but Maggie Thatcher was WC because her father ran a business.
There's a proud Tory voter on there posting about 'porpers', and that alone was worth looking at the thread.
I think I might be a porper.

@WitcheryDivine , Amy is part-Jamaican. Amy's mother died of cancer a long time ago, but Amy's Jamaican grandmother has been heard on TA.

@Choccyp1g , Aunt Satya

So have I @WitcheryDivine ! With rosy cheeks!!

Lukas, Kate's ex, father of Noluthando and Sipho, did appear in a few episodes long ago. It wasn't spelled out that he was Black, but it was pretty clearly implied from his accent and surname. No one in Ambridge commented on it at all, which didn't seem realistic. I don't want to hear racist comments, but on the other hand, I find it hard to believe that absolutely nobody in an English village would even comment on a newcomer's ethnicity. I suppose this has all been concentrated on Usha, both when she first moved to the village and racist thugs attacked her, and later when she married the vicar and put up a statue of ?Ganesh in the vicarage.

Yes, Alan's mother in law is Mabel, I think - strong carribbean accent. She got on well with Jill. Amy's occasionally made oblique references to being black

I think there was a confilct between Mabel and Auntie Satya because both are very religious and the Christian/Hindu marriage troubled them both.

( I like Auntie Satya and wish she would come back more often, she was bossy but fun)

Auntie Satya and Mabel were both great, yes.

Yes @Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g also like the way the entire village was delighted when Adam and Ian 'had' Xander. Utterly unrealistic.

Ah thank you and @Choccyp1g for the background. I missed the whole advent of Amy, not sure when that happened but clearly I was taking a break. Sadly missed the grandmother too! Bring her back.

And apart from all this Paul makes a welcome change from the (mainly) moany or just slightly dense males on TA currently. Great to have a chap who is bright, breezy, upbeat, generous-hearted and positive about things.

I still miss Nigel and remain baffled why the SWs felt it was time to drop him.

Right! I dunno what it is about her

Oh Weaver 😕

Looked up the actor who plays Paul. Very attractive young man! This may mean he won't spend very long in Ambridge, sadly. Felicity Jones is the prime example here. Used to be Emma. Now an A lister, or not far off.

I believe the Pope has said that dogs can go to heaven, suggesting they do indeed have souls, at least as far as the Catholic Church is concerned!

(please no Catholic bashing derailing. I’m not Catholic but here have been quite a lot of Catholic bashing threads recently and it’s a bit horrible).

Nominated for an Oscar and everything!

I definitely think dogs have souls and frankly, are far superior to the majority of people I've met! I might just have had good luck with my dogs and bad luck with my people though 😂

Auntie S was more fun than her niece.

It always brings me up short to remember that benevolent Roy Tucker was part of that racist gang in his misguided youth 😮

Yes, animals definitely have souls, IMO.
Please recover, Weaver.

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g
Lukas, Kate's ex, father of Noluthando and Sipho, did appear in a few episodes long ago. It wasn't spelled out that he was Black, but it was pretty clearly implied from his accent and surname. No one in Ambridge commented on it at all, which didn't seem realistic.

Apart from Eddie asking him why he wasn't wearing his tribal robes.

😬😬😬

Well, that was cruel and unnecessary. Been there too many times to have my heart wrung all over again on a Friday night 😥🐾