Archers thread #198: Josh sent to Patagonia, Pip stays put. Wrong way round! Discuss The Archers here.

[Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g]

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 also confide only in your budgie, or other unusual views.

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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.)

Not feeling greatly enthused about what's going on in Ambridge at the moment, tbh. I'm annoyed at Brian's hypocrisy about Ruairi given the furore over George's attempt to frame Alice as the cause of the accident. I do hope we don't have a slow drip drip drip now as one after another the members of the Aldridge/Archer clan find out what really happened and endlessly agonise over what to do. Frankly I don't care. There! I've said it.

Pip's OK. Well, good, but what was the point of that story, I wonder?

I suspect I'm in a minority of one in rather enjoying hearing (a) from Bert Horobin and (b) about Fletcher. I surmise Bert is here to stay for a while because the BBC has (amazingly) updated his character page: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/profiles/1wQP3mKR6yr9LVs05jddxcY/bert-horrobin (prominent actor photo warning). Given how out of date a lot of the other character pages are, this seems odd, but there we are.

That's all I can be bothered to say! Over to you.

Ooh surprised how few I could confidently name but I guess you don’t necessarily have to point to them?

I can do real Emma, David, Pip, Tracey, and Brian of course. As well as those mentioned.

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g

Pointless just had a question about The Archers! You had to name any of 70 actors who were in the cast picture the BBC did for the 70th anniversary. Only three actors were scoring answers: Tamsin Grieg, Patricia Greene and June Spencer.

I has Felicity Finch, Timothy Bentinck and Charles Collingwood but didn't think I'd have any pointless answers!
Sadly, DH wasn't impressed as he wasn't listening because he was thinking of pointless vegetables.
I refrained from making the obvious comment 🙄

Could we have a PSA on how to get Pip dedded? Show not tell preferred

😂

I wish Anna would STF up. And stop batch cooking when her mum prefers Marmite on toast.

Equally amazed!

I don't understand why, if my daughter was climbing the walls, hasn't Ruth ask for the BRCA test. I would do it straight away. Pip is nuts though.
Love the church bells I hear them every 9 o clock on a sunday morning, its such a lovely sound, especially if its sunny and Im hanging washing out.

Although the SW had Carol say marmite toast - which has shocked me more than I can say …

We were told the church bells sounded odd. Are there bats in the belfry, affecting the sound?

Although the SW had Carol say marmite toast - which has shocked me more than I can say …

Yes that shocked me too. Have never heard anyone say that before. Anna nagging Carol and batch-cooking actually did remind me of the years I spent bustling about the kitchen going on at Dad about what he should be eating etc after Mum died. He was appreciative of my efforts but I was probably quite annoying. Now I live alone, I might skip dinner and have half a bottle of wine and a slab of Christmas cake instead so I can see why Carol was bristling at the intervention…

The show has become unbelievably dreary. It feels like all the PSA are being written with a view to the editors being able to say ‘oh we highlighted independent living alone/BRACA gene/mental health/blah blah etc’ at BBC planning meetings. May be they are having to justify their existence more than they used to. Hard to decide what is worse - Azra and Ben going on about mental health, Lynda and the drag queen panto, or Joelene and the Markie subplot…tough choice- thoughts?

I know you can get Marmite nuts and Marmite crisps but I always thought it was Marmite ON! toast.
Also the elder Carol said Kartsy instead of Kirsty, or she did to my old ears.

It really is ON…

You don’t say Beans Toast or Jam Toast or Cheese Toast or Marmalade Toast….ahahahhahah!

People did use to say Dripping Toast.

I know we love to nit pick but we all knew what she meant. Here we say jammy toast because that's what DD called it as a toddler and it just stuck. Judge away! the toast was white bread

It's toast and Marmite ... the same as toast and marmalade.

Conversely I grew up eating macaroni cheese - and bristle every single time I hear ‘mac and cheese’.

I blame the Americans for "mac and cheese" ... and for so much else, of course!

Like Brian's 'couch' a few weeks ago. Something he would never say. Another import.

I've just checked what US-born MrG would call it and of course he couldn't answer, the way you can't when put on the spot! So I offered him couch, sofa or settee (another one, possibly very déclassé or possibly regional) and he said sofa or couch, interchangeably.

Where’s Elizabeth? And Freddie? And Jim?

And Paul seems to have had the longest period of compassionate leave in the whole history of the world.

And Paul seems to have had the longest period of compassionate leave in the whole history of the world. May it continue permanently.

Toast and marmite.

Of course it's ON toast. No way would a 90+ year old be saying Marmite toast. It's as unlikely as her saying the ghastly abbreviation "mac'n'cheese".

Yes mac n cheese is annoying.
Macaroni cheese is the right way to say it, and we always say settee.

I wondered if the church bells sounding odd was a symptom of something or other.

My MiL used to say "anchovy toast" when she had the Gentleman's Relish on toast but Marmite was on toast.
There's the whole concept of Girl Dinners now meaning various little canapés* (and wine), so perhaps Carol's Marmite on toast (and wine, possibly) is an Old Girl's Dinner.
People have odd ideas though. When I was in hospital the food was vile and the only thing I found tolerable was sandwiches. The nurses kept telling me "The doctors won't let you go home unless you start eating hot food".
Obviously rubbish.

My vote for Brian's furniture would be "part of the three piece suite"...
NO! Not really. My bet is "sofa".

*Aka The dreaded "picky bits/nibbles".

and we always say settee.
Good lord.

Brian would say 'the Chesterfield' (not to be confused with Chester draws, obviously)

Girl's dinner - Sod that.
Picky bits - eating lots of calories in a way that registers as hardly anything.

I don't take to Carol but I do empathise with her fear of losing control over her own life. As others have said, it's easy to tell a frail elderly relative what they should be doing, but what if it's not what they want to do? At Carol's age what's the point in following healthy eating guidelines? If eating nothing but toast shortens her life, but makes it more tolerable, why not? She clearly has capacity. Anna should back off a bit.

Having said that, I do feel for Anna too. It's not easy at all being at a distance from a vulnerable relative and worrying all the time that you might get a call with bad news. Carol chose to move back to Ambridge instead of somewhere nearer one or both of her children. She's fortunate that she has friends and good neighbours keeping an eye on her but it's really not fair or reasonable to expect them to do more than help out in an emergency.

All a bit close to home for me at the moment, but we are out of this phase as my Mum is now in a nursing home, which brings a whole new set of challenges.

And on a lighter note, there was apparently a debate at the Cambridge Union last night where, according to the wonderful Helen Joyce There was an unwittingly entertaining speech from the floor by a young woman who said that listening to The Archers as a child made her decide she was trans - first identifying as a boy and then when she registered that she wasn't very good at that (her words not mine) non-binary. As she admitted, most middle-class story ever. My mind is boggled! What on earth could have had that effect on a listener? Some suggestions in the attached screenshots.