Archers thread #158: Te Rum? You numpty, numpty, Tom! Empty tearoom follows. Christmas coming, farmers’ stand up, will it make us LOL? No! 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 Tom Archer is a great businessman, 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 @LillianGish for the title idea, which may plant an earworm if my scansion just about holds up. @BeatriceBatchelor wanted 'plebby coffee' inserted in reference to my Bolivian coffee anecdote on the last thread, so I'll mention it here instead. Here's hoping Fallon and Emma decamp to the charging station or Grey Gables, or both, to run the type of coffee shop/tearoom people actually enjoy spending time in. Tom's cauliflower eclairs and kale criossants approach sounds more likely to drive the casual trade away from the farm shop and cheese window as well as the Google Translate-named Te Rum.

Feeling very uninspired by TA at the moment, so I have nothing more to say for now. Over to you!

I bet Paul has a full wardrobe of Christmas jumpers and costumes…sigh…

Elisabeth will say she'll spend the day with Bryan.

[ducks]

😂

Naughty @Abra1t !!

As a reader rather than (until now) contributor to these threads I have to conclude that if I can't be arsed to pick up on character spelling then TA isn't a big enough part of my life!

Seriously tho, tetchily picking up on spelling isn't a very inclusive look is it?

Neither is deliberately misspelling them to get a response, but I'm aware that it was meant in jest.

Maybe there's a Megan & Harry thread I could comment on instead.

Hard agree @WitcheryDivine @Brefugee - honestly, talk about don't sweat the small stuff. If my mis-spelling a fictitious characters name causes that much angst, there needs to be some introspection!

I have found the last two episodes tedious beyond compare - don't even get me started on Ian the wannabe momager!

Unless I’m mistaken, Joy has never talked about Rochelle’s father either, has she? Do we know if she holds herself out as widowed or divorced or something else?

Joy's backstory will come out eventually, I expect, once she has become established in the community.
She's very chatty so there must be a reason why we know so little about her.

The name misspellings are irritating. Look on the BBC web site if you're not sure. This is a SM site not a school essay!

i would have thought Iains were in the minority at any age. Has there been a recent enthusiasm for Iain?

This Christmas Day question and Joy. I'd think as one of life's extroverts the invitation to spend the day with other people rather than alone would be genuinely welcome.

Many years ago for various reasons I found myself totally on my own on Christmas Day. Although I wouldn't want that every year and it’s never happened since, as an introvert I actually really enjoyed it. I'm not sure Joy would though

That’s an odd one isn’t it? Usually the purpose of an h after a g is to separate from a vowel that would otherwise influence its sound eg spaghetti (not “spajetti”). So what’s the h in Meghan doing?

I’m in my 60’s and Iain was the more common spelling when I was at school. I am Scottish though. I don’t think Iain is a new fangled fad.
It seems to me that people on here struggle with delayed gratification. I think it would be quite dull if every story line was fully played out as quickly as possible. I don’t have a problem with things lying dormant for a time then reappearing later, that’s surely how things work in real life? I find out things that I didn’t know about people all the time, it seems perfectly plausible that Joy has a backstory hidden from these relatively new friends and acquaintances. There are things about me that almost nobody in my current circle knows.
Unlike most of you I listen to the Archers because it’s a bit of harmless, unchallenging entertainment, not to pick endless tedious holes in it. These threads used to be fun.

Elisabeth will say she'll spend the day with Bryan.

[ducks]

Soo naughty @Abra1t! MN is hilarious when the Head Girls swing into action and you get told off for getting things wrong or making sweeping generalisations!

@MereDintofPandiculation , Maybe americans say Megan as Meegun. I know it's not a school essay but on one soap there was a Jackie and a Jacqui, and on TA there are two characters called Chris.

Spaghetti is italian, so the h is there for italian reasons. Wiki says: Spaghetti is the plural form of the Italian word spaghetto, which is a diminutive of spago, meaning 'thin string' or 'twine'.[1], which is a vague agricultural connection. AFAIK there aren't any spaghetti orchards in Ambridge, unless the mystery buyer of the Grange Farm land has plans, or Adil has some trees on his allotment.

I'm just here for talking about TA too. I find the relentless slagging off of characters disheartening.

I am quite enjoying how each episode has some heartwarming pre Christmas content at the moment. I feel like they’re trying to cheer us up (optimistic). Or they could be trying to lull us into false sense of security (hope not).

I reckon joy served time for helping her husband fake his own death and now he’s swanned off to Thailand and she’s left with kids who hate her for putting her through all that

Will Lynda be funny?

Not intentionally

i spent Christmas alone (house share, everyone was away, parents in another country and i worked in a pub, triple time for my 3 hour Christmas Day lunchtime shift) when i was 19. It was fine, i made roast chicken and lived off it for a few days. Really lovely. Even made soup from the bones.

But i wouldn't really want to do that every year.

I think Joy will be fine with Paul, Paul's parents (will they both turn up?) and Lizzie & Freddie. (urgh)

ILoveShula
on TA there are two characters called Chris.

But they are both spelled "Chris". It would have been quite useful if one were spelled Krys, back when both were sometimes in the programme at the same time.

What I do wonder, sometimes, is where some of the variations on the names come from. Caroline for Carol Tregorran simply seemed weird to me, and Justine (which is a girls' name) for Justin, and Jesse, which is said Jessy, for Jess. Marianda for Justin's first wife, Miranda, adds a syllable and sounds quite different to me, so I didn't at all know why it happened.

On the other hand I wouldn't be surprised by any spelling of Ruairi or Noluthando, because they're not familiar names in English. Well, maybe if someone spelled them Fred and Ethel...

one thing i did really enjoy this week was Leonard and Stella having a convo after he fixed her watch. (not his first watch/clock repair i think?)
And him warning her about charades... and the obvious way that she's not quite yet family because she hasn't been allocated a task. That was quite a good conversation.

But. It is also ok to moan about the quality of the scripts and story lines. Because they have been simultaneously stupidly "exciting" and tediously "banal". It has been so much better in the past.

I haven't read every post, but has anyone wondered about Brian and Lilian as housemates?

Brian is lonely, Lilian has no right to stay in the Dower House if she and Justin split up.

They've known each other for decades, they're comfortable in each others company.

If it means more Brian, I'm for it. The downside is more Lilian, but she can be OK.

Brian found Lilian intolerable when she came and infested the house where he lived, even when it was a big house like Home Farmhouse. His present dwelling is a two-up-two-down; he'd be wanting to murder her within two days.

And even he finds her drinking a bit much.

You betcha. He's the self-appointed Zany One ("I'm a bit mad, me!"). I like him as a character but in real life I find people like that a bit...much.