Archers thread #180: Burgeoning backstories! Continuity, what’s that? 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 it's a great idea for Helen and the boys to lodge with Tom, Natasha, Seren and Dippity*, 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/5244480-the-archers-spoilers-thread-10-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.)

*Can't remember who coined this, but it's genius.

I was strongly tempted to use one or both of the posts suggested for the title of this thread on the last thread, but went for something a bit briefer. However, they're brilliant and will kickstart this thread very nicely, so here they are:

@Sidebeforeself: Beavers, bridge, bunny boilers and busybodies - it's all a load of bollocks!

(I couldn't agree more!)

@DeanElderberry: I don't usually speculate much on the appearance of characters, but do wonder what it is about Miranda that is bringing out the chest-thumping silverback in Brian and Justin? One little bridge game and the course of Ambridge rewilding is set. The face that launched a thousand beavers.

Over to you!

Oh good call!! Yes that would have been much better

it feels a bit paint by numbers. A sw read book with a foundling and thought that would make a cracking sl. Why they had to retrofit to steady old Neil is anyone’s guess but it isn’t working. I’m switching it off so I can pretend it’s not happening.

I find it quite easy to picture Joy as a moderately big winner on the lottery.

Surely if she were Rochelle would have been a bit more, well, conciliatory rather than confrontational and objectionable?

Excellent. That's a much better SL than we're likely to get from the SWs.

No, Susan, I don't believe it. People spend years searching for lost family but Neil has found the answer in two days. Please!

I rather like the idea of Joy having won a big Premium Bond or Lottery win, choosing to alter her name and move south as she was being pestered by needy causes/chancers. She needed to reinvent her life story on the hoof, hence the inconsistencies.

Yet somehow tracked down by Rochelle...

The reality will be exceptionally dull/not thought about.

Changing the subject completely: last week Mick expressed excitement that Joy had bought a chocolate cake home from the Tea Room. So the Tea Room has found someone to do the cooking who is at least as good at making cakes as Fallon. Yet we were led to believe that Fallon's cakes were particularly special and that she was irreplaceable. (I know I am obsessed about this. It is just irritating me so much.)

I just really REALLY don’t understand why they’re repeating the Adam story! So soon! They even know they are as Susan had Adam over to talk about it. I can only assume they want something BIG to change in that family and this is the clunky AF way of doing it, esp as Adam’s was such a non event in the end so this needs to be different. I haven’t heard tonight’s but perhaps Neil’s mum/dad/uncle Bob made a mint and suddenly want to leave it all to Neil. That would be quite interesting to see the family dynamics change esp with Peggy’s money essentially out of the equation now. I mean Peggy as a source of handouts.

Probably just got some in from m and s

Yes, she put one message up on one website or whatever it was. How many places advertise as helping you find out about your ancestry? I'm sure I have seen people on this site talking about how many different places you can buy the kits from and how you'll only get results if the people you are looking for have gone to the same place, because they don't share their results with any other ancestry-finders.

And, sorry, what was in this message? "Hi, I was found on a doorstep in Southport in May 1957, does anyone know who my mother might have been?" Don't you need DNA or anything like that? Or the least little smidgen of information about yourself?

The panto ticket sl is a farce - who are these people returning all these tickets

the forced conversation about mothers and daughters 🙄

buying supplies in the village shop which seems outrageously stocked 🙄

agree the Neil SL is going from bad to worse. Emma asking why he hadn’t looked before - it’s because he only found out a couple of weeks ago🙄. And can’t Neil check the website? Not sure I’ve heard Neil talk so much before

my money is on Joy not being her real name

I hope that wasn’t aimed at me! I genuinely don’t know what Ive done wrong

Ha ha! No. It’s another thread I’m on. I genuinely don’t understand it. 20 pages of people saying the same thing despite the fact the op has moved on

At least with this thread it’s fast moving with nice little side diversions

It's absolutely baffling and infuriating, @Bruisername. Anybody who has the temerity to point this out on one of the affected threads gets a huffy response saying things like 'Who has the time to read hundreds of posts?' Well, very few, but surely it's just common sense to look at the date of the OP and the number of posts on the thread before you post, and if possible (I know it's not possible on the app, for some impenetrable reason) to read all the OP's posts. If someone can't be bothered to do any of that their thoughts aren't likely to be worth reading anyway.

(Have not yet heard tonight's offering. Will it affect my blood pressure?)

I thought it very waffly on the Neil issue

(also drives me mad when I have a notification and it’s someone reacting to something posted months ago)

Yeah, seems the height of arrogance to think that any advice you give is so different that it hasn’t already been said by one of the 400 people who posted before you. And prefacing it with “haven’t read the thread but … “ doesn't make it any less arrogant.

That said, although I try not to dive into a thread beyond the second page, I sometimes get caught out by not reading the page nos. And find after Ive hit “post” that the thread is on p 17.

Or when I’m reading a thread and come across something I posted, but totally unfamiliar . Then I see it was 3 years ago and realise it’s a zombie thread

I have notifications turned off …

I did wonder, for a moment tonight, if Emma might be pregnant. And assuming her heightened emotional state is purely about George. I’d like it if it were so - but I daresay it is just the George business.

(Have not yet heard tonight's offering. Will it affect my blood pressure?) Today is a different day

Tony is in Call the Midwife! That is, David Troughton is. The character he's playing is about 100 times grumpier than Tony, and a racist too. No doubt by 9pm he'll have seen the error of his ways.

I didn't realise that was him!

My eyes nearly fell out of my head with the epic eyeball roll occasioned by this flummery.

I think I’ll have to skip tonight. I don’t generally care about much about Neil and this backstory is really trying my patience…

however I found Neil's distress at the thought he might have ben conceived through rape moving

I was just coming on to say the same! I do love CTM but it is hopelessly idealistic. I am also mildly depressed for the series to have reached the decade in which I was born