Archers thread #173: The Fall of the House of Grundy? 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 wish we were hearing more of Pip, 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 https://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.)

I chose the thread title to echo one I used three years ago, which is here if anyone fancies a trip down Memory Lane: www.mumsnet.com/talk/radio_addicts/4320618--Archers-thread-130-The-Fall-of-the-House-of-Aldridge-Discuss-The-Archers-here. That was the thread where I caused all sorts of confusion at the start by not starting it before the old thread filled up, but others stepped in, fortunately.

At that point I see Ruairi was heading off to London to start his degree, which he has now finished, with none of us any the wiser about what he studied or where. Perhaps this will finally be mentioned now he's graduating.

And now, over to you!

Oh FFS. The Asian hornet is so hard to spot that David and Ben can’t get close enough for a photo, yet Zainab gets stung by it. Hornets, contrary to popular opinion, are unlikely to sting unless antagonised.

Also if she’s been stung on the face she’s not going to want to leave the house for a few days. There’s nowhere for the swelling to go so the fluid just fills up till you look like a balloon with human features (ask me how I know 🙄).

A really clumsy device for introducing Ben’s new love interest and shoehorning in a bit of farming. I’m bored already with the romance.

Ooh has anyone else seen that there's going to be an official Archers Podcast as a companion piece, aimed at the under 35s and hosted by Bella Freud?

Joy was never rude and unpleasant. If Joy had almost run over a dog she would have been apologising and checking on the dog.

Zainab is completely charmless but it's so predictable.

I find Ben and Josh tedious and interchangeable.

Edit: Emma Freud 😁

Why was Ben inaccurately agreeing that the dog should have been on a lead, rather than pointing out that she needed to have been under control?

I find Ben and Josh tedious and interchangeable

I think that's why they wrote in Ben having the dog so that we know.
Dog: Ben.
No dog: Josh.

So, I stand corrected! Not Polish, not a cleaner and not Yolanta! It was years ago, I thought I did ok!

Dull episode. Jill making her own birthday cake seems a bad sad, but she likes to be useful. Do we know if her fancy man is back?

he left David on his own - what if he gets stung!!

They were going into the orchard near the hives on the lookout for Asian hornets. If they weren't wearing bedsits, they probably deserve to be stung. (Though probably needed an jngloved hand for the camera.)

My sister had a scooter to get from our farm to 6th form college, back in the '90s and not served by the school bus.

God it’s lame

May I nominate this for the next thread title.

Courtesy of @Bruisername

The dog was in the road and nearly caused an accident, so yes it should have been on a lead. We have a couple in our village who make a point of walking in the middle of the road with their GSD off lead and it’s forever zooming off after deer, squirrels etc, it’s only a matter of time till someone hits it.
Then it’ll be tears before bedtime.

Well Gran had a lot to say without really saying anything, if you know what I mean.
Yes the new kid in town is fiesty and that is the only way for new characters to be especially girls, she is too mouthy and nosey. Who would really act like that. You nearly run a dog over, have a row with its owner, bike wont start call to dog owner to help for heavens sake talk about self importance.
Fed up with all the micro managing of Martha, just treat her like a normal kid ffs she will soon come round she is only 3.

Also in years to come Martha will turn out to be a right so and so and run rings round everyone.

Scooter is quite an ambiguous word these days.

It sounded like a moped to me rather than a piaggio

they're laying it on a bit thick with Martha aren’t they?

I’ve just remembered she let herself into the Brookfield kitchen - who does that? Thinking about it more this morning, I think I liked her solely because she took the piss out of Ben and David 😂

Ben is 22-going-on-15, at least as far as social skills are concerned. As the Maliks have come from Solihull, presumably they (or at least the boy) were at school/college there, maybe finishing up GCSEs/A levels? Or just the boy was still at school doing exams and Zainab was keeping an eye on him while mum was working away and deciding whether to stay and move the kids down?

Chelsea is reserved for Freddie, because she'd be the making of him and it would be the death of Elizabeth!

It’s a bit late in the school year for them to be appearing isn’t it?

Agree about the clichéd feisty young woman meets man on wrong foot. Would have been more dramatic if she'd just zoomed off again leaving Ben wondering.

Asian hornets aren't that hard to spot with their yellow legs. ISTR they are more aggressive than regular hornets. But yes, about their sting. Interesting point about ecological xenophobia (but it would have been better made about something innocuous like bluebells, not Asian hornets, which are a real threat).

As for annoying incomers, I still remember Aunt Laura.

Marthurrr is traumatised by the apparent abandonment by her mother and the pillar-to-posting care. And finding the true power of toddlerhood. Alice is going to have to work hard, and were we being given signals that she's tempted back to drink by the hopelessness of it all? (But she will be brave and Say No and pour the vodka down the sink? And then have to explain the empty bottle to Chris??)

So close to giving up on TA again. It's only these threads that keep me going.

What with the collapsing pie-table, the sudden invasion of Asian hornets and the meet-cute with the rude maybe-teen who can't act for toffee, my tolerance for listening is (as so often) being sorely tried at the moment.

God it's lame

👆Yes please for this as the next thread title.

The whole thing was bizarre. What was she doing snooping about someone's house?! Weird script, felt like it had been written by kids! I'm definitely losing the love for TA lately. It's such a shame.

Another vote for God it's lame. 😆

Also, it was pretty obviously Azras daughter from the off but were the Asian hornets there as a ‘hint’?

I am not at all convinced they all think Lynda is wonderful, no matter how much the editorial team try to foist that line on us

I don’t know why the SWs don’t include some
of the locals just rolling their eyes and saying ffs whenever Lynda comes near them. I can’t bear any kind of community events (I had to go away this weekend to avoid the annual street party that is held outside my front door). If anyone like Lynda approached me with a clipboard and a suggestion of how I might like to participate they would get very short shrift - standing around in the street chatting to the neighbours is simply not how I want to spend my time.

The almost-reverential way everyone seems to treat Lynda and Robert (see Chelsea, Fallon and Ben at D-Day event) is simply unrealistic.

No, I think it was an old fashioned public service announcement. It was a shocking bit of shoehorning, and I'm not sure which bit came first. Maybe DEFRA has a hotline to TA. Asian hornets are a fairly new menace, and devastating to bees and other pollinators.

Asian hornets are a real concern in my part of the country. Flying over the Channel in hordes, like German bombers apparently. There are lots of reminders locally to report any sightings and then air raid wardens in the form of militant apiarists come out and look for and destroy their nests.
I was woken up at about 2 am recently by what sounded like a motor bike in my bedroom. It turned out to be an enormous hornet - honestly it looked about 2 inches long - blocking the way between me and the bedroom door. I was terrified and it took me about half an hour to chase the evil swine out of a window. I got a good look at it while it was trying to kill me though and it didn't have yellow legs so I took comfort in the fact that I was being terrorised by an honest British hornet and not a dastardly Asiatic one, and I didn't report it to the emergency hotline. I still can't believe how huge and loud it was though.

Yes I’ve heard a lot on the news and my kids are both terrified of them!!!