Archers thread #202: How are you finding your visits to Ambridge? Fill in your feedback forms 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 working as a hotel receptionist is a perfectly reasonable career choice for a graduate from a family with a stately home, 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-12-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.)

Over to you!

I once rescued a bat, but I didn't cuddle it all night long like carol. There are bats here, I see them at dusk every summer, they don't live in my loft though, I think they must live in the huge trees at the edge of my garden.

I came home one evening and it was lying on my drive, clearly had a broken wing. I knew they were protected so phoned the RSPCA who said I should put it in a shoebox with a piece of cloth for it to grip onto, and give it water on a cotton bud. It was fascinating, it had tiny little beady eyes and a minuscule pink tongue. I put it in my understairs cupboard all night and they came to get it the next day, I never found out what happened, I hope it recovered and went back to the wild.

Anna is a horrible character.

I wasn't expecting the kettle to arrive until the following Monday at the earliest when I ordered it!

Was all set to start boiling pans of water to make a cup of tea.

Having it delivered the next day was such a nice surprise.

Oh, you sound lovely!

That's exactly what I would have done.

Bats are really beautiful, aren't they?

They are.
I've lived here for 30 years and love to see the bats flying round on a summer's evening. Sadly there are fewer of them than there used to be years ago. At dusk I sit outside with a cup of tea and watch them flying round, they're so tiny and so fast.

I have every sympathy for carol and the bat storyline. I think Anna probably just chucked it into the hedge not caring if it would live or die. I find it unlikely that a healthy bat would have calmly let carol hold it all night long.

I don’t think the bat had any choice but to be held in its bundle all night by Carol.
I feel for Anna, Carol is difficult, spiky, ungrateful, stubborn etc. Anna is exasperated looking after a mother who has never seemingly been very kind or supportive.

I had a bat in my cottage once; possibly the cat brought it in, although the cat did seem a bit surprised! It was flying around my living room, and not knowing what to do, I sort of treated it like a flying insect: turned the light off, and when it came to rest on the ceiling, put a shoebox over it and slid some cardboard in. I carried the shoebox outside and put it on my drive, and went back in to Google what to do. Saw all the advice about keeping it inside the shoebox and getting the bat people out to come get it (problem was, they were closed for the weekend, so it would have been days!), and read that you shouldn't put the box outside at ground level, and not below a certain temperature...both of those conditions applied, so out I trotted to fetch the bat back in. But the box was empty, so I hope it had simply flown off and gone back to its home.

At the moment when I cycle back from the horses, I go along a path beside the river, and at dusk, it's full of bats. One collided with my helmet two days ago! There are also tonnes of bats to be seen flying above the courtyard of the house.

My SIL had a Dualit kettle. That's why I wanted a SMEG. I was a bit jealous of her new kettle. Not that we are in competition or anything just was a bit envious. She did like my new kettle.
Its funny how little things please.
Next I want that new Henry slim vacuum cleaner but at £300 its a bit steep for cleaning carpets. Hey ho.

My sympathies are more towards Anna. She is at the end of her tether trying to help Carol stay vaguely safe whilst still independent, and Carol thwarts her at every turn. Add to that being contacted to provide a shoebox for a bat. Also cutting her from the memorial was very poor.

This comes partly from my fielding occasional phone calls asking where things are for my DPs who live 2 hours away. Usually no problem, and as I am good at noticing things I often know the answer. But occasionally if I am tired / stressed for other reasons the request doesn't seem so reasonable...

Ive been until recently a lurker, but have listen to TA for about, on and off for years but, 5 years since I retired everyday.
Carol and Anna I hadn't heard of really until recently. Has Carol always lived in Ambridge or has she recently moved there.
Kiera and kahil are so not interesting, I think even younger listeners( if there is any), would find them really boring.
I think the Script Writers need a good shake. Even when I first really listen, 5 years ago it was better except for when they had the covid phone calls. I think thats when it started to go down hill.
It is such a shame because TA is a National Institution, or used to be.

Younger characters aren't always very exciting, but they grow on us over time. I think we need to hear from the teens in order to care about them in their 20s.
Poor Keira needs some of Kalil's confidence.

I think Keira's obvious paranoia about people giving her dirty looks is leading to another mental health crisis story. It has been brewing since she ran off on NYE.

I actually think the Anna/Carol relationship is really well done. That kind of living on the edge of the phone call in the night then it being about a bat - I would have hit the roof too if I’d been Anna. She was probably concerned about what she’d find and then it was just a bat. Not sure if anyone has said how far away she lives? But honestly as a main carer to multiple elderly people the absolute madness, stress and worry is bang on imo.

Carole has been reintroduced as the token old person living alone - everyone else is surrounded by family, if not actually living with them. Her situation is typical of a large proportion of old people in RL, my own mum included. It could be a compelling storyline except that they have cast a much younger actress (ironic when so many younger characters are played by much older actors) who sounds indistinguishable from her daughter. She has a hinterland, but it’s before my time and since her reintroduction she’s been mainly silent - occupying Jill’s cottage but virtually silent and unmentioned. I have no interest in her whatsoever and any mention or appearance only serves to remind me of the absence of Jill - whose slow deterioration would have been a much better storyline, but instead was turned into a silent superwoman who the SW now have no way of killing off.

Exactly how I feel. I’ve only been a regular listener for about 10 years so had never heard of carol (though remembered Anna from Helen’s trial. When t he SWs bring long ignored characters back after a decade or more, they’re brand new to listeners like me who have no interest in them. Not sure what you answer is though as obviously some listeners have been regulars For their whole lives.

But then, she must be meeting men regularly at Grey Gables, and if they run things like conferences a proportion of attendees will be single.

Lily hasn't ever been an art student, has she?

Agreed. I'm very much Team Anna with regard to the bat. The poor thing was probably terrified being kept prisoner all night by Carol, and very glad to be able to fly away. I really didn't get all the angst about the shoebox either - if she didn't have one, surely she could have found a bowl or something as a container?

Team Anna - Carol is insufferable.

A few months ago of our cats brought us in a bat at 5am. This video came to mind (and I think our nice neighbours might have learned a few new words):

@JudyCoolibar, @Throwaway380 , Lily hasn't ever been an art student, has she?
No and has not shown any inclination in that direction. She had a Gwen John painting that she discussed with Russ, an art teacher, and that was instrumental in them embarking on a relationship. Russ was the artist.

Lily was an English student, then later studied estate or land management.

I don't believe Russ ever taught Lily; he was the deputy principal of the college she was at, but not personally her tutor.

Russ having reached that position in his profession, and Freddie saying that Russ was old enough to be her father without her contradicting him, was what led most of us to assume Russ was almost certainly at least eighteen years older than her, which at that point meant he would have been at least thirty-six; another interpretation of Freddie's words would have been that he was old enough to be Nigel's contemporary, which would have made him fifty-eight, and I think it was generally felt that was a bit too old to be realistic as an eighteen-year-old's crush. All Freddie actually called him, apart from old enough to be her father, was "middle aged".

I agree with this and in addition think it’s odd when they have so many other ‘active’ characters we don’t hear from for months.

I just hope the infant bat was alright in the end.

And, yes, I hope Carol recovers from her night in the church yard.

Anna didn't really throw the bat into the hedge, did she?

That would have been an evil and cruel thing to do 😲

She said the bat flew off, so it sounds like it was fine.

Oh, I'm glad.

I was worried about what happened to it.

But didn't she sound so callous about not caring what happened to it?

I know she was concerned about her Mother, but the life of the bat mattered just as much in my opinion.

Is it just me who thinks like this?