Archers thread #160: Ram a lamb a ding dong! To rate the mass wisteria in Ambridge, tap the feedback tablet 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 have given a home to Hilda the Hellcat, 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 @MerryChristmasToYou, @OverArmour and @LillianGish for the thread title ideas.

This week is a bit better than last week, but the Brad/Adil/Lily stuff is very odd. Coming up to the anniversary of Jennifer's death (22nd January last year). We need a new matriarch - could that be Natasha? I find her quite an interesting character. Sometimes she's awful and then she has moments as last night where she utterly redeems herself.

Over to you!

These days they live with their parents because they can't afford to live anywhere else!

Edited because I can't be bothered arguing on a Saturday night 🙂Peace and love.

But is that 43% of households - so includes older couples and single childless people?

Older couples who don't have children still don't have children as a default? And single childless people also don't have children as a default.

And people who leave it too late, of course, may find that not having children has ceased to be a lifestyle choice and become a sad fact of their lives....

But I don't believe that it is the case any more that anyone who has caught a man defaults instantly to having a baby. They don't have to; they may choose not to, like Fallon.

I think in Fallon's case the man caught her

Yes; I was trying to think it the way that would have someone default to having a baby as soon as they have a man around to pay for it. That involved "catching a man" rather than merely meeting one.

This is crazy 1950s-think, isn't it? We were growing out of this mindset by the 1960s after the Pill came along.

@AskingQuestionsAllTheTime , I haven't heard anyone being accused of 'trapping a man' for decades.
'Trapping a man' was when a young woman got pregnant to trap a man into marriage.
I have heard people saying things like 'She tricked him into getting back with her because she wanted another child but didn't want them to have different fathers.'
As I pp'd, The woman's fault.

These poor men being tricked into fatherhood by wily women.

I didn't write "trapping a man", which is you say has a particular meaning; I wrote "catching a man". I also thought I had made it reasonably clear that I thought it was idiotic to think in that way in 2024: it's sixty years out of date.

I know you didn't. It's just that it was something that I heard a fair few times back in the day when 'having to get married' was a thing.

Catching a man was different, but I think if you weren't able to work if you had children you needed to.

Are we having another ding dong? Wondering if statistically we have more ding dongs on this thread on a weekend or a weekday?

The ONE stat you quoted was for households without children - no mention of whether they'd ever had children in them, so it's difficult to know whether any choices not to have babies had been made in those families.

*ONS

I was wondering this myself. I may need to deploy signals.

🔔< Commence the ding dong!

🔕< That's enough! Peace and love time!

Ha, I think you’re right. You need to officially sanction ding dongs to be within agreed time slots. Perhaps they need to be licensed, like a street party.

@JanglyBeads , I read that last one as One Night Stand and thought I might have missed a Ding dong on TA.

@OverArmour , I wonder how many posts are more ding dong than TA.

Love it! Can't find a bell emoji though

Haha Ding Dong reminds me of Brighton’s Christmas lights one time.

Are there any streets in Ambridge?

🙋🏻‍♀️I ordered my Chorley cakes…

🔔 colonbell

Maybe The Bull could hang it, I feel like Lillian and Jolene would appreciate it.

I'm listening to an Arnold Bennett play and could quite go an oatcake.

Good. Let us know how they turn out. I'm invested in it now. I hope your dad won't be disappointed!

Is this what it’s like to be lost in the Bermuda Triangle? This thread has gone nuts! My sister would say it is probably due to the alignment of Mercury this month but she is very like Kate.

I think it says a lot about the current SL. I would prefer not to have to discuss Helen so going into a deep dive on an issue facing one character is quite welcome!!