Archers thread #191: Mulligan: stew made from odds and ends; second chance after poor shot. Both fit the bill. 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 like George you like your steak very well done, 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.)

Mulligan mostly makes me think of John Finnemore's Souvenir Show. This is good, and tenuously connected to a recent TA storyline

Over to you!

Thanks!!

Thanks, @Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g . Are we taking bets on Cleo being mentioned again before the end of this thread?

Adil Shah - aka Ronny Jhutti, the man with the beautiful voice. Bring Him Back!

Please no.

Thank you Gasp0de

Love the thread title - and Finnemore extension - @Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g!

(Even though the whole Meadow Farm story is pure slurry …)

Hmm are radio 4 planning a Meta Theme week on the Logistics of Death Administration with all that chat from Esme. She veered from irritating posh like Amber to Jolene rural voice in last night's episode repeated just now.

By way of that, I have just come across this archive article, from 2014.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/webarchive/https%3A%2F%2Fwww.bbc.co.uk%2Fblogs%2Fthearchers%2Fentries%2F05f5cdc6-d5c2-34b1-ad8d-a2784debf828

"..In most farming families, ‘succession planning’ – who in the next generation takes over the farm and who inherits what – is a thorny subject. Just so in Ambridge.
The tussles over the inheritance of Brookfield, with its farmhouse, land and farming business, date back to March 2000, when Ruth and David told Phil and Jill that they were planning for another baby. It prompted Jill to think that perhaps the time had come for her and Phil to retire, and let David and Ruth take over the farmhouse.
The farm was valued at about £1.5 million. Phil’s accountant recommended selling some of the land to David and Ruth, to release about £200,000 to buy Glebe Cottage. The farm business would also have to generate £18,000 a year as a pension for Phil and Jill. It was an exciting but daunting prospect for David and Ruth.
Kenton – now living in Australia – had already had his inheritance, having been bailed out of various business disasters. Shula was content to learn that she and In most farming families, ‘succession planning’ – who in the next generation takes over the farm and who inherits what – is a thorny subject. Just so in Ambridge.

The tussles over the inheritance of Brookfield, with its farmhouse, land and farming business, date back to March 2000, when Ruth and David told Phil and Jill that they were planning for another baby. It prompted Jill to think that perhaps the time had come for her and Phil to retire, and let David and Ruth take over the farmhouse.

The farm was valued at about £1.5 million. Phil’s accountant recommended selling some of the land to David and Ruth, to release about £200,000 to buy Glebe Cottage. The farm business would also have to generate £18,000 a year as a pension for Phil and Jill. It was an exciting but daunting prospect for David and Ruth.

Kenton – now living in Australia – had already had his inheritance, having been bailed out of various business disasters. Shula was content to learn that she and Elizabeth would share the proceeds of Glebe Cottage when Phil and Jill died. would share the proceeds of Glebe Cottage when Phil and Jill died..."

£1.5m in 2000 would now be worth i guess at least £5m?

Thanks Gasp

George annoyed me last night, bullying Jolene into giving him paid work. As a pub landlady, I'd expect her to have more backbone but George is a Grundy to the core.

Agree about George being really pushy. Am looking forward to the inevitable fallout in the Bull though….

That article will never feel archival to me, @Lalgarh - I still remember every scintilla of audio and imaginative input as Phil and Jill explained that the farm, and the years of work they’d put into it, were their only pension …

Perhaps it’s because the whole thing was so ridiculously and impossibly complicated that the SWs have shied away from any definitive, meaningful, epoch making inheritance writing since then. They fudge everything (Lower Loxley! Peggy’s money! Home Farm!) and hope we won’t notice.

Thank you @Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g as ever!

I haven’t even finished last night’s episode yet but if Jolene says yes to George I’m going to vandalise the pub myself. As if she’d countenance the man who did so much harm to her daughter being in her face at work!! No flipping way.

Lucky that she asked the staff what they felt before offering him the job, really.

But Lilian demanding she ban George or Lilian would pack up her dollies and go home was a bit out of order.

Honestly this week has been nonsense. Who’s writing at the moment?

My mum would never even have employed the girl who pinched me at nursery let alone the local hoodlum who caused a car crash. Bonkers.

Was Wayne in prison at some point or did I imagine that?

I thought it was Alice who caused the crash by trying to exit the car prematurely. I concede George was driving. The rest is history.

I don't keep an actual tally but they do seem to have a lot of different writers / directors.

I think Lillian going off in a strop is the way I would have acted. Jolene is nuts even considering that snidey little toad George. She already had a heart to heart with Fallon and if that was my daughter I would have banned him as soon as he stepped foot in the pub.
On the subject of names I heard some women call her DD or DGD Halo, my Dh and I looked at each other and said "what the...?".

Oh and I love Donkeys Gasp. love the story that they all have a cross on thier backs because one carried Jesus on Palm Sunday.

That always reminds me of GK Chesterton's poem, The Donkey:

When fishes flew and forests walked
And figs grew upon thorn,
Some moment when the moon was blood
Then surely I was born.

With monstrous head and sickening cry
And ears like errant wings,
The devil’s walking parody
On all four-footed things.

The tattered outlaw of the earth,
Of ancient crooked will;
Starve, scourge, deride me: I am dumb,
I keep my secret still.

Fools! For I also had my hour;
One far fierce hour and sweet:
There was a shout about my ears,
And palms before my feet.

Gives me goose pimples.

Yes. Jolene surprised me. Surely her only reaction to his manipulation AKA the wheedling "I did you a favour and nearly ended up doing more time" would have been something along the lines of "I'm genuinely sorry about that. But remember, you harmed my daughter, so if we're measuring karma/favours I'd say we're even and I don't owe you anything".

Pat should offer him a job at BF now that Adam's no longer there.

Bonus points if it winds up Tom and Helen.

It's very convoluted isn't it? The tedious Marky nonsense drags on - George grassed on someone in prison (and yet miraculously suffered no consequences) and is now using that fact to try and manipulate Jolene because Kenton is conveniently (and somewhat unbelievably) absent spending two weeks with his now silent sister - all to make Lillian threaten to withdraw her share and put the future of The Bull in peril. Meanwhile a previously unmentioned farm has suddenly materialised along with a farmer and daughter noone knows anything about and now Oliver and Caroline's foster children are about to be resurrected and brought into play. I'd actually like to hear from the characters we are already invested in - I'd love to hear how the house share is going at Beechwood! What's happening with Freddie's inheritance?

The logic was a bit weak. As you say, @BeatriceBatchelor, it would have made more sense for George to try and beg for a job from Bridge Farm, given that he was working there before. Despite family loyalties it must be obvious to the Grundys, if not George himself, that he did more direct harm to the Bull clan than to the BF clan. It’s really hard to believe he’d ask Fallon’s people for favours.

But it’s nicely plotted! What with Tony at BF and Lilian at The Bull, he has enemies everywhere.

I did wonder if this story is now leading to the passing of shares in the pub to a new name, though I can’t think of an obvious inheritor.

Crossed you, @LillianGish.

I don’t mind the idea of bringing back some of the foster children - though it’s inevitable it will be done badly. What puzzles me is that it’s needed Zainab - who’s been in the village five minutes - to take the initiative regarding Oliver’s birthday. He lives with a houseful of Grundys who never pass up the opportunity for a shindig - and they must have some contact with his daughter in America. If anyone was going to organise an 80th birthday event it would have been them.

I did wonder if this story is now leading to the passing of shares in the pub to a new name, though I can’t think of an obvious inheritor

Fallon! With or without her absent husband.

Indeed @TottersBlithely! Instead Zainab has been instructed to liaise with Susan - will she mention Neil's new status as a foster child himself I wonder? It's as if The Archers is now being written by people who have never actually listened to The Archers.

Where would Fallon get the money to buy shares in the pub? She wouldn’t need to anyway as she’ll presumably inherit her mother’s share in the fullness of time.

What The Bull will need if Lilian flounces is a financial backer, not a worker.

Where would Fallon get the money to buy shares in the pub?

The Ambridge Money Fairy, of course!

Or she could take a business loan.