Archers thread #179: Beavers, livestock, ferrets, but nododo! 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'd be happy sharing a hot tub with Mucky Mick, 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.)

The title started life with @JanglyBeads, whose autocorrect turned 'Oh no, nor do I!' into 'Oh no, nododo I!' on the last thread. For reasons of cowardice/prudence/lack of inspiration and the character limit, I haven't included @BeaLola's even more mysterious autocorrect - her phone had her asking Abdul if he'd always wanted children instead of Neil. Perhaps one of the mooted beavers can be Abdul.

For the first time ever I've added a poll to the OP. Over to you!

I think Rochelle just decided she wanted a free taster of all the activities on offer.

I think she and her ma are grifters

There was. Joy.
Stella before the SW thought they would make a literary connection.
Hannah.
And I nearly forgot Cursedy.

Also, Helen isn't a blood relative, so could have been a possibility, with added inheritane battles.

Do you mean - Helen and Brian?

I think I need to get myself a drink

There was. Joy.
Stella before the SW thought they would make a literary connection.
Hannah.
And I nearly forgot Cursedy.
Also, Helen isn't a blood relative, so could have been a possibility, with added inheritane battles

Were you thinking of these ladies as possible candidates for Brian?!?

How on earth could Joy have been a likely partner for Brian?

Never in a million years.

Nor any of those slips of a girl (Stella, Hannah, Kirsty). Nor his brother in law’s daughter. The very idea!

Possible but not necessarily likely.

I also forgot the lovely Lizzie.

(I know the SWs had Debbie mistake Joy thus - but I can only put that down to grief on the part of the character, or unfamiliarity with TA on the part of the SW.

Best forgotten …)

Lizzie! Lizzie!!

next you’ll be suggesting an affair with Jolene

I don't think the mistaking Joy for JD was unreasonable. Similar clothes, the same unusual scarf, similar hairstyle, and a similar height and build, plus that part of the mind that wanted to see JennyDarling make it plausible.

@Bruisername , ugh no. From JennyDarling to MoiDarlin' is too much of a stretch for me even.

There's a nice series of tik tons by the BBC on how they make various sound effects etc. here's a link and I imagine it's available elsewhere but im at work.

vm.tiktok.com/ZGdSgjRV1/

I'm thinking of Brian's previous dalliances - Caroline, Siobhan, a flirtation with Betty Tucker, Mandy Beesborough (silent - so we don't really know what she was like). Miranda just sounds too pompous and self-important to be Brian's type - easy to believe she was married to Justin - but dragging him off to bridge tournaments and challenging his beaver expertise, I just don't see it. Stella would have made for a much more interesting match (before they decided she would be the perfect partner for TWFL) and it would have made an interesting storyline regarding the inheritance of Home Farm going forward stirring up tensions with all the other pretenders. Instead they've paired him up with a pompous old bore who's at permanent odds with another pompous old bore - neither of whom has a proper hinterland in Ambridge so I don't really care about either of them. I'd like to see A bridge too far in the next thread title as a homage to the previous bridge drama.

Think you might have had one too many at the Bull!
Brian wouldn't have considered Joy for one second because she's just too down-market.
Brian's about 81 or 2 isn't he, those other suggestions are early 40s maximum, yes he has liked much younger women in the past but somehow I can't see even he going for a 40 year age gap and would they want a man over 80?

It was Alice (not even pissed at the time) who mistook Joy for Jennifer, since Joy was wearing a scarf or something of hers she’d bought at a bring & buy.
Debbie thought Brian was confusing Joy with Jennifer (i.e.
shagging her) when she misinterpreted Joy’s presence in
his house. Such a sweetheart, is Debbie.

Surely you would need to heat the barn otherwise it would be freezing. Bloody expensive and I would think and who's paying for that? Rochelle?

Did Ruth and David insulate the barn? Surely they would have needed to if they want to use it all year round for events.

All so implausible

@ThoroughlyModernNotMillie , is she downmarket? She has a daughter with a downmarket name, a hot tub, and a regional accent, but does that make her downmarket? She has her own house and car, and doesn't need to work. She is a good cook, kind and generous, in good health, is willing to try new things, and is female.
... a 40 year age gap and would they want a man over 80?
I've been on here long enough to not be surprised at what some women look for in a man. Brian has a lot going for him. He'd be good company.

I don’t think Brian would be interested in brash women

I've never been to San Francisco but it always looks sunny on TV so I would have guessed it was warm.

I thought the house numbers discussion was interesting but I would have scrolled past a discussion on the intricacies of bridge.

Yes Joy is downmarket, shown by, as you say, her daughter's name, hot tub and strong accent. She also has no air of sophistication or elegance at all. She may well be financially independent but that means nothing. It's impossible to imagine her going to functions with Brian or hosting like Jennifer did. The fact that she thinks someone like Mick is a man she wants to be with confirms what type of person she is.

Brian would be good company that's true, but still, 40 year age gap, it's too much, can you imagine what Mumsnet posters would say.

<makes another note>
<spots that the previous note contained the word 'bollocks'>
<begins to ponder>

Miranda's mother was Celia Johnson, her uncle was Ian Fleming and her great-uncle was Augustus John. If only the SWs would just let her tell family stories, she would be much more interesting!

If her great-uncle was Augustus John, does that mean her great-aunt was Gwen John?

Ish. What actually happened was that her paternal grandmother had an affair with Augustus John after her husband died and had a child out of wedlock, who was therefore a half-aunt to Peter Fleming's daughters (who apparently now have the royalties from Ian Fleming's estate, as he had no children - what a lot one can learn in 10 seconds on Wikipedia).

Perhaps Miranda could be shown Lily's Gwen John and feel a mysterious affinity to it.

Reading further - I see now that Julian Fellowes was probably ahead of me and had also read Amaryllis Fleming's Wikipedia entry, or similar, when he was casting about for storylines for the later episodes of Downton Abbey.

Fleming was born in 1925, reportedly in Switzerland.[1] She was born out of wedlock to the painter Augustus John and his mistress Eve Fleming, who was the mother of the writers Peter Fleming and Ian Fleming by her late husband. Most of her life she was raised as the adopted daughter of Eve Fleming as a pretence to hide the circumstances of her birth. The discovery of her true parentage only in 1949 when she was in her twenties "had a traumatic effect".[1][2] Fleming was thus a niece to John's sister Gwen and aunt to actress Lucy Fleming.

Exactly the sort of thing that nowadays is coming to light when people lightheartedly send off DNA samples to Ancestry and so on. The R4 series The Gift, as referenced several times on this thread, has cast light on this. As others have said, there is no way on earth Susan wouldn't have bullied Neil into doing this years and years ago, but of course we know the SWs have just invented this foundling story because they have not grasped that the listeners remember that Neil had a quite different back story decades ago when he arrived in Ambridge.