Archers thread #181: Panto Week's behind you! Was that the nadir? 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 enjoy playing badminton with Derek Fletcher, 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.)

Will it be onwards and upwards for TA now, or do we fear even more of these special weeks (Martin and a Christmas Carol, Scam Week, Panto Week) and sudden reinventions of long-established characters (Neil)? I for one have had enough of all that. I want a quiet period of change counting in the village shop, farming talk with suitable sound effects and village gossip over coffee at Terum or a pint in The Bull. Slowly developing storylines featuring the full cast, not a subset for a few weeks with no mention of the others, and all behaving in character. Not holding my breath we'll get any of that, though!

Over to you.

I was catapulted back to the '80s by your Cookability reference Gaspode - I can hear the jingle and see the flame popping up now. It seems to have set off an earworm loop unfortunately, featuring ticka-ticka Timex tra-la-la, how many kinds of beautiful homes in a Hoseasons holiday brochure and whooaaahhh! Bodyform ...

I make coffee using an old-fashioned metal coffee-maker and every morning I think about the Gold Blend couple when it makes a gurgling sound. I also pinched an inch yesterday and automatically thought ‘you better watch your weight’; and don’t get me started on the Branflakes couples on the balconies….

The whole charging station thing is a bit of a mystery all round come to think of it @TottersBlankly Was it just there to give Fallon a reason to jump ship from the Terum? Because she wouldn't have walked out of her job without it? She would never have gone straight to The Bull - she needed to be hanging around at a loose end. Is that why her charging station business plan was such a ludicrous vegan/dairy free nonsense - setting it up for failure from the start? The charging station has now dropped completely off the radar - there was I thinking it might provide a new location in the village, but it has no purpose at all now (except for random motorists driving some distance off the motorway to recharge their vehicles outside the village). I hate it when you can see the nuts and bolts of the plot and this has felt like turning a tanker - sending Harrison to Yorkshire and Wayne to Panama.

It wasn’t clear whether Azra knew about Khalil and Robert’s planned outing was it. No way would I let a new family friend’s husband take my kid out to the afternoon to an undisclosed location. (Let alone a remote hut fgs)

I don’t really mind about the Bull storyline. In real life people don’t always jump straight to the “sensible” answer because either it doesn’t seem likely to work out or there is a more obvious answer close at hand (eg Tracey already being at the Bull working) or they’re just too frazzled to think about it, it hasn’t dragged on more than a couple of weeks so 🤷‍♀️

The bird hide outing was there to demonstrate that Khalil likes to be hands-on with animals - walking a dog, holding a llama’s head or wrestling a goat. He is not content to be an observer. Zainab is much happier at a distance! Both kids sound like they can more than look after themselves - I’m pretty sure there were no sex pest undertones intended.

I bet you remember the Opal Fruits and Spangles adverts too.

Presumably you knew that Fairbrother senior is/was the Gold Blend man (Anthony Head).

I noticed Helen's mention of the reed beds when they were talking about pouring milk down the drains. Would that get Bridge Farm off the hook?

I've not been so bothered by the references to "pouring down the drain"; I assumed it was meant metaphorically rather than literally, since it's a common expression to say that resources such as money are being "poured down the drain". The unfortunate thing being that in this case, the resource in question is a liquid and could in theory be poured down a drain!

I would assume so, as it would mean the milk is not leaving the farm.

And that we've heard them physically pouring it, on two occasions now.

Having worked on and in several reedbeds, I don't think having gallons of milk pouring into them several times a day is ecologically sustainable. Milk in watercourses can be a massive pollution problem and reedbeds are no different. The reedbed filtration system is designed for sewage, not industrial quantities of dairy waste.

And did Robert really say "Good spot" to Zainab when she saw a goosander? I've watched birds for 60+ years and no serious birdwatcher would ever say 'spot'. 'Well spotted' perhaps.

Thanks for the information about the reedbeds. I have a feeling we got given an actual amount that had been being poured away each day; does anyone remember it?

I'd have to listen again and it's not something I want to inflict on my system. Was it 150 litres? Once a day or twice? How many cows are they milking?

I think it would have to be twice a day or the cows' udders might burst. They get very nhappy if they aree not regularly milked, anyway, after having been bred to give more milk each then a dozen calves would be able to consume.

I meant is it 150l total or per milking...

I can't even remember how much Tom said they were having to dispose of! How many times a day, if he mentioned that at all, went straight past me.

As for how many cows: In the first stage of this, Helen was planning to buy ten cows locally and "the rest" from France, making a special trip there to look at them, but "the rest" could be anything from four to forty so that isn't much help.

An adult Montbéliarde has an average annual lactation of 7,486 litres, apparently, but without knowing how many they have in their herd that isn't a lot of help, is it. But that's a bit over twenty litres per cow per day, so even if they have only ten that's two hundred litres a day going to waste at the moment.

Emma's coming into her own with her parish council hat on! Good for her.

I was all primed to feel sorry for Joy - imagining her helpless fury.

But no, the SWs wouldn’t even give me that.

Urgh Mick and Joy are just gross.

It's worse than that: they're DULL.

I too like Joy and hate the way her character is turning out, and really hoped she'd tear the fecking awful Mick a new one give him right telling-off. He's awful, and have never got what Joy sees in the feckless freeloader.

Very much enjoyed Emma's determination.

I have never liked Joy as a character but I'm surprised that even she would get together with the dreadful Mick. And today, calling her "woman".. just awful.
But after she sympathised with Fallon about how awful it is to be alone, I've concluded that she's one of those women who thinks it's not possible to make a full life for herself alone and believes that any man is better than no man. That's how she's landed up with Mick when most women wouldn't give him a second glance.

Are they going to tip a load of manure at the water company HQ?

I am pleased to report that although I listened to this evening's episode, by the time we finished supper at about 8:15 I had completely erased it from my memory. I suspect this is not so much the beginning of the end as galloping ever closer to the end of the end. And I feel gleeful!

I liked yesterday's episode. I liked Emma doing something useful as a Parish Councillor, and I welcome the prospect of the return of Pat the Activist. I also liked TA addressing the entire problem of underinvestment by water companies - Borchester Water's crimes are a mirror image of what far too many water companies are up to. Though I agree that Mick disappearing would be no loss.