DumTeeDum - A show about BBC Radio's 'The Archers'

Wicked Uncle

This week’s podcast is presented by Stephen and Suey.

We hear from:

· Tracy, who has a prediction about Alice's regression therapy;

· Globe-trotting Richard, who isn't impressed by Natasha as an entrepreneur;

· Leigh from Cookham, who has a different plot prediction about Alice;

· Witherspoon, who is putting on a hat and asking us to close our eyes;

· Katherine, who has a question about Alistair's housing choices;

· And finally Claire from Clapham who is concerned about what Emma and Will are doing;

We also have an email from Lilian McCarthy

Plus: we have the Week in Ambridge Live! from Suey, a roundup of the Dumteedum Facebook group from Vicky and the Tweets of the Week from Theo.

Please call into the show using this link:

www.speakpipe.com/dumteedum

Or send us a voicenote via WhatsApp on: +44 7810 012 881 (07810

012 881 if in the UK) – Open the WhatsApp app, key in the number and click on the microphone icon.

Or email us at dumteedum@mail.com

How to leave a review on Apple podcasts: https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/podcasts/pod5facd9d70/mac

***

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Duration:: 1h 5m
Broadcast on:: 25 Aug 2024
Audio Format:: mp3

My dad works in B2B marketing. He came by my school for career day and said he was a big row as man. Then he told everyone how much he loved calculating his return on ad spend. My friends still laughing at me to this day. Not everyone gets B2B, but with LinkedIn, you'll be able to reach people who do. Get $100 credit on your next ad campaign. Go to linkedin.com/results to claim your credit. That's linkedin.com/results. Terms and conditions apply. LinkedIn, the place to be, to be. If you're taking care of a senior loved one, then you know it can be hard. Remember, it's okay to ask for help. There's a reason why 29 million families have turned to care.com. Experienced senior caregivers can help with everything from meal prep to taking your loved one to doctor's appointments. And every caregiver you hire is background checked. So important for peace of mind. Find full time, part time, or even occasional help that fits your family's schedule and budget. Get the support you need with care.com. This is a Royfield Brown production. Find others on Apple Podcasts. [Music] This is Dumpty Dum, a weekly podcast about the archers and the goings-on of Ambridge. I'm Stephen Bowden, and I was demoted to the lazy weeder all day. And I am Siri, stranded in as litter picker for this week's Dumpty Dum. And then there's you, our lovely Dumpty Dumbers, walking around in hemp sacks, waving a stick with a bird's nest in your hair. Welcome to Dumpty Dum. A place to talk about the things that are happening in our favourite Borserge village. This week's scripts are written by Sarah Heher, who is one of my favourite writers. And I enjoyed the way she built up the tension during the week until Friday's big reveal. Coming up, we have calls from Tracy, who has a prediction about Alice's regression therapy. Globe trotting Richard, who isn't impressed by Natasha as an entrepreneur. Lee from Cookham, who has a different plot prediction about Alice. With a spoon, who's putting on a set and asking us to close our eyes. Catherine, who has a question about Alice's housing choices. And finally, Claire from Clapham, who is concerned about what Emma and Will are doing. And we also have an email from Lillian McCarthy. Plus, we have The Week in Ambridge live from Sooey. A roundup of the Dumpty Dum Facebook group from Vicki, and the Tweets of the Week from Theo. So let's start by going straight into the roundup of The Week in Ambridge. This week, as I said, coming to you live from the studio. Over to you, Sooey. So, with the village fate and cantoring on racing towards us, it's been a right old week in Ambridge. The veterinary practice is going to be very well represented at cantoring on, as Paul will be judging the fancy dress competition. It was very clear that Paul has never done this before. As they come with a five-star warning for any judges, especially if done the way Justin wants it done, with just three medals so that the kiddies really want to compete. Actually, Paul, I taped that back and applaud you as he turned up on Friday night at the stables with a small suitcase full of medals, worthy of a village fate or stables open day, which is going to really annoy Justin. The medals stopped just short of the dog with the wagiest tail. I can imagine that being handed out by Don James, Alistair's boss, who summoned him to a meeting after a dog owner docked him in for his inappropriate behaviour with Denise. It was all good, and we discovered that Don is in a long-term committed relationship with dog-level, and they gave their blessing together with a gentle rollicking for not informing them. Denise is the best nurse they've ever had, so not Paul. Picking damizens for Jim's jellies, which sounds like an incredible double-on-toned, Alistair and Jazza thrashed out how Alistair and Denise could get together for some single-on-toned time. Kirsty popped up like a jack-in-the-box and said she needed a housemate now, because Roy has left. Sound imperfect, Denise was all ready to share with Kirsty and make a little lure of Nurse. Kirsty extracted her pound of flesh by getting Denise to do the litter-picking at the fate, so that she can shooze a potential re-wilding donor at the stables. It was all going swimmingly until Roy decided to remotely sell Willow Farm, so now both Denise AND Kirsty will need a new home. Is it time to reclaim Kirsty's house from Helen and the boys, and throw them to the mercy of Pat and Tony finding them a space between the poggy tunnels? Talking of Bridge Farm, Will had to step in for George, who we'll come back to, and it's fair to say, farming is not Will's bag. He can manage a bit of lettuce-picking, but proved a total incompetent at driving a tractor, so much that Tony told him not to turn up for the rest of the week. It's impressive to think in the Grundy family that when it comes to farming, that George is the competent one. He certainly lucked in in almost any other redeeming features. After agreeing with his parents, he would go with them to the police. He was suddenly absent, and his bag and some clothes were gone. Emma and Will, instead of bringing the police, she's adhered about with him, until they heard from George that he was safe, and then they lied to everyone saying he's gone on his holly bobs. To Brighton, Gormouth, Bogner, Paul Mayby. Anywhere, he was in a caravan with his mates, so he could have somewhere nice to fret about the court case. Back at Bridge Farm, Pat and Natasha dreamed a lovely holiday, a sausage boy Tom and Natasha in the autumn. Ed and Will had a brotherly chat about, frankly, how rubbish Will is, and a celebration for Emma's upcoming GCSE result day. It turns out she got a grade eight in GCSE English, but sadly, she took no joy in that because of her feckless son, George. Ed is worried, Will is worried, and then Susan demanded the first piece of cake for raising such a splendid daughter, and nothing changes. A message arrived from George, he was on the way home, but he was bringing someone with him, and it's not good news, according to Will. Well, Will, I beg to differ. As for us, and our need for drama in our docu-drama, it's great news that he's come back with, on Cook Live, Horribin. For those of you who don't remember Uncle Clive, he's the one who raided the post office, got Susan sent to prison for harboring him, set by to the stables, and killed George Bathard the ex-copper, probably killed him, and would have killed Jill Archer, leading to a distinct line of lemon drizzle cake. Seriously, he's a wrong one. He whilst into the house and started making a curry, then George said Clive told me he'd got to keep quiet as Alice might not go to prison anyway. Then Uncle Clive told Emma that he was staying, and the road to love and forgiveness led to Ambridge, and if she disagreed, he would make sure everyone knows what a little boy has done. Now, we just have to wait and see. Has he pushed Emma too far? I suspect not. We're just going to have to wait and see what happens next week. There you go. Thank you very much, that was brilliant, brilliant, and all done in one take. So how was your week been? I was in the week in Dublin making this world a slightly safer place. I trained a whole lot of people in how to send a particularly lithium batteries on a plane, which is remarkably difficult, and then I got back and it's raining and Hurricane Lily or whatever it's going to be called, Storm Lily is on my way. Lily of I think, isn't it? Just like that. Sorry, Lily, indeed. E-Manarina, Lily of I think, isn't it? That's right, that was what made me think of me. Who's an E-Manarina later. I had a very good weekend last weekend. After recording and editing last week's Dumpty Dum, I went off to stay overnight with an artist friend who lives in the darkest depths of Harrisonshire, and she and another artist friend of mine are doing a book together, and I backed the book through the crowdfunding site on Bounds, and as part of that, I got a visit to Tamsin's studio, and that turned into not just a visit to the studio, but a barbecue with the publisher and some other people involved in it, and all I had to do was A, turn up and B, bring a long cocktail-making kit, so I was mixing cocktails for the assembled company, others were doing the food, and it was just a fantastic party, and then I stayed at... I've never got to do one of those for anything I've backed on Kickstarter, I'm clearly doing it wrong. Oh well, Unbound has got very civilized ways of doing these things, and the book is called Wild Folk, but it won't be out until I think the mid-summer of next year, but that's probably enough about us. Let's get on to the important bit, which is you, our lovely call-arineras, and first up, after the familiar sounds, will be Tracy. Hey, Tracy from California here, so I'll say first that I do not like Natasha's character, but for once I agree with her, which was weird for me, because I never understood with her about anything. I think she's horrible, but when she was talking about George, I was like, yeah, she's absolutely spot on. I don't think anybody is going, like Alice or anybody is going to try to use what comes out during her regression therapy as evidence in court. I think that it's going to come out, and Alice is going to use that to confront George and his little camp about it, so I think that's how that info be used. I hope they let Harrison take the lead on figuring it out, so he can shed that sort of milk-sop image, because they write him as a very weak dude, but I kind of like him. I might be one of the few people, but I actually like his character, so I would like for him to be written more as like a stronger guy. And lastly, I love how Jasmine messed up the name of the event. That was hilarious, and I wish the writers would have written more misremembering, misspoken statements or versions of the event name. Anyway, those are my thoughts. Have a good day. Oh, that was brilliant, Tracy, and I can tell you, I pretty much agree with absolutely everything you said there. I loathe an attacher with a passion. I'm really cross about what they've done with Harrison and how they've weakened him down, and I think Jas is brilliant, but I thought it was really interesting about is the hypnotherapy stuff going to be able to be used? Because you were talking about that last week, Stephen, and how it goes under the criminal evidence act bill, I think it was. Police in criminal evidence act. So I would really love to see George Dogdin on it. I think there are various ways in which George could get Dogdin. Would agree that Alice using the hypnotherapy stuff actually in evidence would get challenged pretty easily. But I think that it will be enough to give them a start, give the police a start from the investigation, of course. But the interesting bit is, have they actually used any of the red forensics from the car? Because why have you not found your fingerprints and all that? I don't think they'd have done any forensics on the car costs money, and it was an open and a sharp case, so why would they? So I think that that's not really going to happen unless they've got a reason to it. I think once they start doing it, if they preserved things like the car, they'll be able to sort that out afterwards. But up to this point, I don't think they've been authorized. That's true. Don't think so. But then it might have been written off, so it might have been scrapped anyway. No, that's true. So actually, was it involved? Did it hit anything? No. It should be fine, because it didn't hit anything. The car that suffered the damage was one that was driving. Yeah, there's a scope for that. I tend to agree with everything that Tracy said as well. And I like Harrison, where I disagree. I'm just not so keen on Jazza, because I remember when Jazza was an heir to well. And he was a very bad man when you turned up. As indeed, we're the Horribans. So both Tesla and Tracy have undergone this massive transformation. But when it comes to George getting dopped in, the other possibility, and we might come to that later on, is that Emma will dog him in, because she's got form for that. I think she has to. She reported Keith to Crime Stoppers anonymously after he set fire to the barn at Brookfield. I think it's surprising when you look back, how many things get set fire to in the archers, isn't it? Makes great radio. All those flames. Yeah, lovely crackling. Shall we move on to our next call then? And this one is from Gloat, or thing Richard? Richard calling in from Rome. I was struck by the way Natasha seems to be running her business, and British farms about matter, but they're not proper entrepreneurs. They're working flat out in their businesses, rather than on their businesses. And a good business man or woman. No subtle, nice things change. Things work smoothly when they're not around. That clearly isn't something they've achieved in the moment. Of course, many people are far fighting. They have to get involved in the change in the way the business works. But in this case, there's no immediate crisis going on. No massive changes. Yet they don't seem to be missing what I would call the definition of a well-run business. That's it, really. Everyone's having a wonderful summer. I am. Bye. Thank you, Richard. And I'm glad to hear you were having a wonderful summer, and Rome must be quite fun. I hope it's not too hot there. I would agree that summer orchard is not a sort of entrepreneurial type of business. It's hardly a tech sector disruptor, or anything else like that. It's just a brand of fruit juice that Natasha has built up, largely through marketing, I think, rather than anything innovative. So calling her an entrepreneur is, yes, misleading. She's just somebody who is selling a better version of fruit juice. And I'm not even sure it's that better, but she's somehow making it an aspirational brand. And that seems to be her main line. I can't see how you turn that into a modern disruptive business. It's just not the sort of thing that you do. And the same goes for the rest of British farm. They were leading in terms of going organic. But ever since then, I think they've just been doing all the things that other organic enterprises do, read beds were good, and so forth. But none of these are really business things. They're more about sustainability and so forth. Would you recommend? Yeah, I completely agree. I mean, I run a business where I am the business. And so I'm very clear that if I'm not doing the work, then it's not happening. But Natasha ought to be using people in a much better way. If she's not going to be there to actually look after a bit of fruit in the orchard. She's got people picking fruit. She's got people making the fruit juice. It's not rocket science. And British farm, I love what they used to do in the old days. It really felt like they were changing the world. And now it's just they've got the farm shop. They've got the dairy. They just pooped along and put the stuff in the veg boxes. So there's nothing earth shattering about any of what they do there. And as I say, I loathe Natasha so she can't do anything good in my eyes, to be honest. It's a bit all naughty to say, but it's true. Well, it's just a little bit harsh, but I think she is deeply irritating a lot of the time. I do remember Pat being very irritating in the 1970s. So maybe Natasha will grow on me. Yes, Pat used to be this feminist firebrand with her course on whatever it was that she ended up having an affair with her. Women's studies, I think. Women's studies, that was it. Yes, that's selfish. Oh, yes, we've tried to remember the name of the guy, Trevor or something. No, it wasn't Trevor. That was lost in the midst of time for me. It must be 30 plus years ago, it happened. 50 years ago, 45 years ago, late 70s, I think, or possibly early 80s. I don't think I just keep implications of it at age, to be honest. I know I remember it being very bad indeed. The whole thing was, yeah, it was Tony being very old-fashioned, I think, and the village gossiping about it. Oh, and then something that was serious rather than just fun. I suspect it was Martha Woodford was at the gossip at that time. Very much so. The village shop has always been the absolute epicenter for all of that gossip. Susan is merely carrying on with the traditions of decades in the past. Absolutely, yes. Next up, we have a third-time caller, Inera, and it's Lee from Cookham. Hi, Lee from Cookham. Long-time listener. I had a time caller in, I believe. The last one I called was at the height of Alice's alcoholic storyline, the first time around. Anyway, it's like plot prediction, I think. Basically, I know everyone's going on about all these people that are going to eat humble pie when they find out Alice wasn't the driver. My plot prediction is maybe that he's suffering personality back together again, because Chris has been in absolute support to Alice, and believed her and her story that she wasn't the driver, and has done nothing but been there for Alice. So, yeah, I'm kind of thinking, yes, everyone's going to have to admit they're wrong, but could this be the bringing together of Alice and Chris again? Because he's just been there for her. He's always there for her, and he's always loved her. And will she see this and think Chris really is the one for her? I'd love that. Anyway, lovely, thanks very much. Speak to your feet, bye. It's brilliant that you've called in for a third time and keep doing so, because all the voices that we get are fantastic to be able to hear everybody's point of view. I would love Chris and Alice to get back together again, and I do think he's gone above and beyond to try and be as helpful as he can to her, and I know it's in his vested interest to be able to make sure that she can operate in the best way she possibly can, for Martha's sake, but he doesn't have to do all of the things that he does, and I think he's shown himself to be a particularly decent human being. The thing that would stop me getting them back together is that she would have to get married back into the family that includes Susan and Emma, and whilst I love Susan, I absolutely adore listening to her. I would not want her as my mother-in-law, I really wouldn't, and get in Emma back as a sister-in-law, and can you imagine the re-wedding they'd have to have, and how Susan would try and take it all over. Emma would be standing, tussing on the sidelines about any choices that she did, but for Chris and Alice together, I think it's the best thing that they could possibly do, and Martha could have her parents back together, but I think this one is going to run and run and run for a very long time, before anything happens between the two of them, and we've seen what happens when she met somebody else, she went with the right wrong gun with Harry, so let's not have a, I would really like Alice to get a good redemption out of this. What do you think Stephen? I disagree, I really don't think Chris and Alice should get back together. The reason that Alice decided she had to move away from Chris is because he is too much of his mother's son, he can be incredibly judgmental and sanctimonious, particularly about Alice's drinking. He's in a much better position now, he's learned a lot, he's developed a lot in terms of his understanding of what it's like to deal with an alcoholic and with alcoholism, but even so, I think that there's too much water flowed under the bridge, I think there's too much harm from some of the things he's said and done. They seem to have settled into a very comfortable position with Martha, so I think that she's getting well-parented, very well-parented, and I'm not sure that the two of them getting back together again is going to make that any better. There's somebody else in the village who is lusting off to Chris quite obviously and Hannah, so I think that Chris and Hannah would make a much better couple than Chris and Alice, and I'm not sure what Alice, to her future holds, absolutely Harry was completely wrong and she needs somebody probably stable and so on to support her. She doesn't need to recover and she's doing a pretty good job, but I just don't think that Chris is the answer at all. I don't remember having her having any other relationship before Chris. No, she was with Chris before they went to university or before she went to university at least, so I think in terms of anything more than schoolchild-type relationships, Chris has been her only serious partner and then there was Harry, and I think perhaps she needs to look around a bit, explore the world, and find somebody who is more suited to the current Alice than the Alice who was 17 or 18 at the time they started their relationship. No, that's very true, perhaps date somebody who lives in a different county as a radical fold. There are no other counties, there's Birmingham and London, and there's Gorsuch anywhere else, anyone else is away in silence like Argyle or Canada or these places that people go Norfolk through various people I think you've ended up in before. For a holiday, there is this erosie lives in Norfolk I think. That's right, and then the Twin Town, Mirabel or whatever it's called, that they don't seem to have talked about for 20 years. Mirabel, yes. That's the one? Yes, the twinning has gone out of favour I think, though I think Jacqueline recently went to a twinning event for her, so I think that it still exists in the continent. This next call starts in a very similar way. You'll know how this goes. KBB are here, the blues are called in, toss salads, that's scrambled eggs. Greetings, Stephen, too, and all dumb tea dimmers around the world. It's with the Spoon and Angus Haggis here, color-intering after Thursday's episode. Okay, I'll admit it. I hold what seems to be of you in opposition to what most dumb tea dimmers seem to hold. Since George fasted up to his mother, I felt sorry for both Will and Emma and the bind that they are in, a bind created by George. I'm going to put my psychiatrist specifically child and adolescent psychiatrist hat firmly on, as I've treated countless teens who have done bad things and their parents. Though off the top of my head, I can't think of a case where someone has done something as bad as George has done. Now, I want you to close your eyes and imagine if your child, age 19, fully an adult in the eyes of the law, and in their belief that they make their own decisions, has told you they had done something really, really awful, committed a crime that might land them in jail, has continued to lie about it, and has put someone else in jeopardy of being found guilty in court and in the eyes of the entire community. They also tell you that you cannot tell anyone else about it. Firstly, 2020 hindsight, Emma made a mistake in promising George not to tell anyone. But really, what does violating that oath mean? You, as an adult and parent, have to do the right thing. But there are competing drives here. Emma's first instinct, I think, was to get George to do the right thing. She was mortified by what he had done. Her message to him has been to go to the police and tell the truth, but can she drag a 19-year-old to the authorities? What would be the ramifications to their long-term relationship? Her competing parental instinct is always to protect George from harm. She recognizes that if someone else tells the police what happened, George would be at greater risk for jail time. Emma did tell Will, of course, the truth. Had been more empathetic toward Will in recent years than others have, Will suffered from a form of post-traumatic stress disorder in regard to Emma, Ed, and the origin story of George. Nick helped to heal him. She died and he became depressed. But he's become a nicer guy, a better parent to George, a better brother to Ed, and a better expouse to Emma, as well as being a good step-parent. He's also been torn as to what to do regarding George, and for a short while, he gave his son tacit approval to lie. But then he had what I thought was a couple of very good conversations with George. Emma and Will brought George to the point of himself going to the police, but George screwed up again and put his two parents in an even more difficult position. Understandably, many in the village are going to be very angry with Emma and Will. I've got my popcorn ready. Talk to you soon. Thank you for that call with us, Boone. And I agree with almost everything that you say. I do think the problem is George and that that he is such a vile individual, possibly even sociopathic, psychopathic. As I know, you don't like to diagnose people without actually meeting them, and I can see the sense in that. But he's a pretty awful person. And so I think that absolutely Emma was wrong to promise not to tell anybody when George spoke to her. But I think that she's also wrong not to go to the police now that she knows what he's done, because he is too dangerous to be allowed to stay around. And now that he's mixing with his uncle Clive, it's only going to get worse. And I think that Emma needs to realize that George is not actually capable of forming the sort of adult moral judgments that somebody of his age. And I know people say that young men aren't really mature until they're in their mid-20s. But even for somebody who's 19, George ought to have a much more moral compass than he's got. And it's not going to suddenly, magically, appear. So he's not going to shock himself to the police. They need to shock him. I completely agree. He's never going to go. Somebody else is going to have to do it. I dither between feeling very sorry for Emma and Will, and then I watch them dithering, and then I want to bang their heads together. At the point at which Emma and he said, "Oh, you've got to promise me. You're not going to tell anybody else, Mum." And I was shouting at the radio at that saying, "Don't promise. Whatever he's going to tell you to do, it's going to be really bad Emma. You should never, ever make a promise to a child that you can't keep. It's just, it puts you in such a total dilemma." But you can see, if you look at what George has had, there's a set of role models in his background. There was probably never any real hope for George, because everybody in the Grundy family is ducking and diving and doing whatever they can to make a bit of money. The only exception to that, I would say, is Clary. And I feel incredibly sorry for Clary. But it's just going to progress further and further and further. And I really don't see how George is ever going to get a redemption from this, which is very sad. One of the mistakes that Emma and Will, or Emma, and Ed, I can't even remember who decided how to name George, is giving him a single syllable first name, because he's a horror bin. And when it comes to male horror bins, the ones with two syllable names, so that would be Gary and Stuart are not great role models, but at least they stay the right side of the law. The ones with single syllable names, Clive and Keith, are the ones who end up in jail and who commit these crimes and burn things down. And so George, with a single syllable first name, is taking after his uncle Keith and his uncle Clive, and even in the nature of the crimes, because Clive burned down the police house, which is now where peacers rose from those ruins. Keith burned down the barn at Brookfield. And in fact, there was a good chance that George might have been in that barn, because it was where Emma and George were staying at the time, and George and George saw that, lost in that fire until they turned up safe and well. And George started off by selling fire to the post-box. Absolutely. Arthur runs in the family with single syllable horbins. And so if only he had been named Algernon, or something, with plenty of syllables, he would have been a lot better behaved, and might have been a model child. I'm sure Witherspoon will very much have an opinion on that. Naming children. I mean, how many people with multi-syllable names in the archers have put into trouble? Freddie had two syllables, and he ended up in jail. Susan had two syllables, she ended up in jail. But I don't think anybody who has three syllables has ended up. I'm going to suggest that you may be using your theory and a justification at this point. It's quite a big extrapolation, you've gone down. Well, that's what we're here for. Absolutely. The extrapolation and speculation. I like a good bit of speculation. So those are the first few calls, and there are a couple more to come. If you'd like to join in by calling us yourself, or dropping us a line by message or email, Sui is here to tell you how, and all the details are also in the show notes. So the first option is to record a message or a plot prediction by going to www.speakpipe.com/dumptum. There've been some issues with Speakpipe ongoing, and including what we're hoping is a temporary reduction in call length to 90 seconds, but we are looking into it and trying to get it fixed soon. Alternatively, you can send us a voice note or a written message via WhatsApp, and that is on 07810 012881. And if you're calling from outside the UK, then put a plus four four and drop the first zero. And if you can keep your call to a maximum time of two minutes, that would be super. Or you finally, we've got an email address you can contact us on, if you would rather write to us with your views. It's a maximum of 250 words, please. And the email address is www.dumptum@mail.com. And do bear in mind that you've got to be at least 18 to contribute. If you're taking care of a senior loved one, then you know it can be hard. Remember, it's okay to ask for help. There's a reason why 29 million families have turned to care.com. Experienced senior caregivers can help with everything from meal prep to taking your loved one to doctor's appointments. And every caregiver you hire is background checked, so important for peace of mind. Find full time, part time, or even occasional help that fits your family schedule and budget. Get the support you need with care.com. Ryan Reynolds here for, I guess, my hundredth mint commercial. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. No, no, no. Honestly, when I started this, I thought only I'd have to do like four of these. I mean, if unlimited premium wireless for $15 a month, how are there still people paying two or three times that much? I'm sorry, I shouldn't be victim blaming here. Give it a try at midmobile.com/switch, whatever you're ready. $45 up from payment equivalent to $15 per month. New customers on first three month plan only. Taxes and fees extra. Speed slower above 40 gigabytes of CDTails. My dad works in B2B marketing. He came by my school for career day and said he was a big row as man. Then he told everyone how much he loved calculating his return on ad spend. My friends still laughing at me to this day. Not everyone gets B2B, but with LinkedIn, you'll be able to reach people who do. Get a hundred dollar credit on your next ad campaign. Go to LinkedIn.com/results to claim your credit. That's LinkedIn.com/results. Terms and conditions apply. LinkedIn, the place to be, to be. Now, let's get back to our calls. Next up is Catherine. Now, she called in early one evening and then called again later and I'm running the two calls together. So, it's the sound of her voice changes halfway through. That's why here's Catherine. Hi there, it's Catherine. We're bringing up a Thursday night. Firstly, Aleister, why does he not own a house? He must be 50, 60. He sold his business. He's got loads of cash. I know he's living with his dad, which might be expedient, but he'd have a rental or he'd have something. He's got nothing to share for all those years in employment. And they're both going to live like students and rent a room in a house. It's just ludicrous. Even Jazz has moved out, yet he's still there with his dad. Secondly, the business with Ed and Emma, Ed's been mysteriously silent for all this time. And Emma's still not told him and anyone knows that this long kept secret is going to end disastrously. The George thing continues to be quite annoying, but exciting. I quite like the George story. And where's he gone? Well, we know. Because as of Thursday night, everyone's excited about who's going to speak for Kamala Harris. Who's her mystery guest? Could it be Taylor Swift? Could it be anybody? No, I think it's George from the archers. That's why he disappeared off to. So, yeah, why does Alice not own a house? It's very strange. She just listened to Thursday nights to add to my thing about accommodation. Roy is selling Willow Cottage. So that will mean that Kirsty is homeless. Kirsty, there's no point to her. I don't see the point in Kirsty. Why doesn't she just leave and go do something else? But Kirsty owns the house Helen's in, I think. So either Kirsty goes to move in with Helen and her boys, or could she imagine? Oh, that would be terrible. Or she says to Helen, "Piss off your grown-up now. Get your own house." Weird thing about all these adults not having homes. And she moves back in there with Denise, who also needs to have her own house. Well, Alice supplies Willow Cottage, and they have their own house. You get what I'm saying? I mean, I know we always laugh about the accommodation in the archers for dramatic purposes. But the idea that these people after years of working don't have their own homes, or a secure rental at least, is very strange. That's brilliant. Thank you, Catherine, for that. I honestly, listening to you, you're saying all the things that I'm thinking. But what it comes down to is the massive housing crisis there is in the country. Which, do you remember when they built Beachwood? And I was thinking, "Oh, this is great because we're going to have all of these new houses. We're going to have new people who come into the village and we're going to be able to hear new voices, they've got new storylines and all of that. We don't know about any of that. Basically, we've got a couple of people, including Helen with the boys, living on Beachwood. And that's it. And then the new doctor moving in and renting one of those houses. But you do think, well, what's Alice actually going to buy? Maybe her boy Willow Farm. Maybe he and Denise will move in there. Maybe Kirstie will end up in a yurt somewhere on the spiritual home side. And then, and then, this is one of the things that's made me absolutely infuriated, is there we've got home farm with the gills in it? And why have we never heard from the gills? What an absolute wasted opportunity. We could go in and see what's replaced Jenny's kitchen. And I feel really thwarted by the scriptwriters and the editor that we've never got to see the new version of home farm. Anyway, that's one of my personal bugbears as to when we've got property in the village, they put people in who we never hear from again. I think the gills is a slightly special case. I believe that Kerry once said that there was a storyline planned involving the gills. And then early 2020, Covid came along. The number of episodes was cut from six to four. And they had to thin out the storylines. And I think they were still in recovery mode from the damage that Sean O'Connor had done during the Robin obsession, which meant they had a lot to do to rebuild every day life in the village birth marriages and deaths and so forth. So they couldn't afford the gills storyline at that point. And they've never gone back to it. Now, I would really like to know who the gills are. I'd really like to know what's going on at home farm and how they are living in home farm house totally surrounded by the home farm farming activity that Brian is running with Stella and so forth. Absolutely. Stella's office must be virtually next door to where the gills are and we get one mention a year maybe of the Muslim family. Because they must leave the house at some point at which point people will see them. Presumably they're going into Borchester to do their shopper underwoods and they never even popped to the village shop for a pint of milk. But it just seemed completely unrealistic. And just because we didn't do them in 2020 doesn't mean that we can't do them now. No, absolutely. I think we can. We know nothing about them at all about from their names and they ripped out the kitchen. That's all we know. They had a big party when it was arrived. And there were some stone heads that they found up on one of the hills, didn't they? They had been in the garden. There were various things that happened just after that. But that didn't tell us anything really about the family that was there. I think going back to Catherine's point, yes, housing in Ambridge is a bit crazy. And I think our final call from Claire is also going to touch on that point. But they have to somehow keep control over the village. And we've only got a limited number of people that we ever hear from. And we have to focus on them. And we the program has to generate drama for them and being made homeless. It's what it all comes down to. It's a bit like that. I think that the one suggestion that is made that Kirsty should kick Helen out of Beechwood. The problem there is I think that Kirsty has effectively agreed to rent the property to Helen on a sort of rent to buy basis. And in perpetuity there was never any time imposed. No, she's not really just a tenant. She's a sort of long-term purchase of the place. So I think Kirsty is left. Someone exposed. The whole thing is just, I think, a bit, it's the need to generate drama. And sometimes it can be a bit frustrating that the tools used to demonstrate drama are so limited. And giving somebody a housing crisis, it was hammer last time. Now it's Kirsty and the house there. It's true trying to hear. You have some drama about housing. Yes. But I guess, as you say, it reflects the situation in the country as a whole, or aren't enough houses to get around at the moment. And so even in places like the archers, you end up with a certain amount of shuffling around people and waiting for somebody to pop their clothes so that their property becomes free. And let's not have anybody else die. I'd like us to have a nice stable population of the village. I can't imagine killing anybody off at this point. No, but there are quite a few very old people, Bert Horribin, Jill Archer, Peggy's still alive. No, nobody can kill Jill off. Chris is still alive. Chris Barford rather than anti-cob borders. Yes. But she's in the laurels, isn't she? He's not taking up her house at this stage. No, she works. She's in a cottage, I think, at the laurels. But yes, it's certainly not an open market house, as it were. And no, well, Bert is actually the one who's taken up the house, but there's the rest of the family. Yeah, they're not going to move somewhere else. Otherwise, we then have a completely different housing crisis when he goes. Should we move on to our final call of this week? And this is from Claire. Hi, MD Dom. It's Claire from Clapham here. I'm very nervous about how Emma and Will are sneaking around behind Ed's back. It all feels really quite mysterious up to the fusion. Ed's clearly concerned about Emma. He spotted something's up. I wish they'd just told him what was going on, to be honest. I can see it all blowing up in a big way. But then, of course, if they tell Ed, then George will go absolutely mad as well. I'm bringing him on Friday morning. I don't know who George is bringing home with him, but I'm guessing it's not nice. Was it Meg, the horse factory lady, which is where I'd hoped he was hiding out. I'm guessing he's not hiding out there. He's probably bringing one of the more nefarious Grundy or Horribin uncalls backward in Middle East or something like that. Anyway, so, yeah, that's all been very stressful. In terms of my eye on the housing situation in Ambridge, it'll change again. Where will Kirsty land? Where will... Well, maybe Alistair will buy the house that will own farm and then he and Denise can live there. That would solve a problem, although he doesn't fail a problem. Our Kirsty can move in with the prof. Solted. Lovely. All right, keep up the good work. Speak to you soon. Thank you for that call, Claire. And we talked a bit about the housing. So let's go back to your earlier point about Ed and Emma and Will. And yes, I agree with you. I think that that is heading in their dangerous direction. We've already, as you've said, had Ed talking to Susan about whether Emma was okay after the GCSE results party. And that can only go on getting worse. And as I said in response to Witherspoon's call earlier, I don't think George is worth keeping secrets for at all. I think that it doesn't really matter if Ed goes mad about what George is up to. George deserves every bit of it and has effectively given up on his rights to a fair hearing, particularly after coming back to the village with, as you suspected, a wicked Uncle Horriban, in this case, the worst of them all applied. I think you're right, that it's problematic. But I think the solution is very simple. It's just a matter of Emma telling Ed all about it and a combination of Ed, Will and Emma, dopping the ghastly child in to the police and letting justice take its cause. What do you think, sir? I can't wait for the day they all go down to the police station and tell them what's going on. This was another of my points during the week where I was shouting at the radio. Ed going, "Oh, do you think there's something wrong? Oh, she doesn't feel very happy. Oh, she didn't get mixed on it." And you think, "Ed, I opened your damn doors and look at what's going on. Can you not see? This is an issue." And I just think they have made such a rod to their own back at this point that I cannot honestly see because George isn't, George is not going to turn up the police station, that's be realistic. Who else is going to tell them? Are they the ones who know? So it has to be them, unless they're then broadcasted to somebody else in the village. And then George, I know people have talked about this and what an utter misogynist George is and whether he would get to the point where he would actually physically harm Emma. And the way that things are going, if she was the only one who went and she was the one who actually told the police what he'd done, I don't think George is rational enough to stop himself from physically harming her. And I really don't want us to go down that route at all. So, "Ed, please, Ed, just open your eyes and work out what's going on." Or talk to them. Why is he talking to Susan anyway? Why is he talking to Will? We've had no evidence of him really trying to have any sensible conversation with Emma, which isn't that the obvious place you would start. You're going to talk to her? Yeah, I think he has just always been a bit nervous about broaching that sort of thing with Emma. And he doesn't seem to have a clue as to what it's all about. No. And it's a problem for him. And I think that there's also the problem that it may or not need George to harm Emma if things spiral badly. Emma and Ed wandering around with chainsaws running, the scope of something to flare up into an accident because chainsaws are involved. And that's going to satisfy all of those people who spent all of this time just waiting for the other shoe to drop and the chainsaw to fall out of the tree or the branch to drop on somebody's head. I imagine there's a lot of people thruffing at the mouth, the point at which somebody doesn't shout "clear the area" or whatever it is they have to say. And that, yeah, there's going to be some really dramatic incident. Otherwise, we're going to spend the next 20 years waiting for it to happen. George or Clive might have the sort of people who wouldn't care the drop zone when told. So, there's always a possibility of a happy ending in the best known hoover branch or chainsaw lands in Clive or George. So it's not all bad, this dangerous business of sea surgery. I think we're trying too hard for a happy ending there, sadly. Oh, that would be lovely. So those are the calls. Thank you so much for calling in. We always say this show is about what you the listeners think. So please do tell us how the week was for you in Ambridge and call in next week. Now, did we have any emails or text messages this week? Yes, we did. We had one from Lillian. As we mentioned earlier on, Lillian McCarthy with the subject line was Paul Spiked. And it goes like this. Hi, Stephen and everyone. After last Tuesday's episode, which I was amazed that nobody called in about, I posted on the Facebook group that I thought Paul had been the victim of his drink being spiked by Kieran. I thought this because Paul seemed to get very drunk very quickly. And also, Kieran was trying to get Lily and Ben out of the way. So he could have the opportunity to be alone with Paul. Why? Also, and I know this won't be a popular point of view, but often storylines in dramas follow on from each other. And there has recently been an incident of Spiking in another BBC TV drama. Thanks once again for a brilliant podcast. Best wishes, Lillian. Thank you for that fighting message, Lillian. And yes, we were surprised that nobody called in about Kieran at all. And we didn't really discuss him either during the podcast last week. I do think there's something very off about Kieran. He seemed to be very controlling and so forth. I'm not sure that I thought that Paul had his drink spiked. Paul is perfectly capable of drinking himself into oblivion and making bad decisions as a result. And so I'm not sure that Kieran necessarily put anything into his drink, but I do think that he probably manipulated Paul to get himself invited back and has now been stymied by the living arrangements at the stables and the fact that Lily and Josh were there. So he was unable to have his way, whatever that way was, whether he's wanted to steal stuff from Paul or generally be unpleasant. He certainly seems to be a nasty piece of work. I was so impressed with Lily. I mean, Lily turned into an absolute bear mom, basically getting, you get away from my friend. It was a bit like Sigourney Weaver in the Aliens movie with Newt. And I was cheering her on all the way because Kieran was definitely a bad man. But going back to the, you know, have we got a bit of a theme, have we got a thing? I'd be really interested to see how the powers that be clearly when we go back to Robin Helen, for example, and that was the timing of all of that went together with when the coercive control act came into force. So is there a little list of things we'd like you to include this week or this month? Do you remember what it was Paul was talking about? It was an actual puppy day or something like that that he mentioned on Friday? Well, notes are downstairs, so I can't remember what it was. National Plum Day. Plum Day, that was right. I knew it was something beginning with a P. I know that calendar, presumably every week they have a look and see if there's anything exciting that you can mention. But there does seem to be a lot of the time, there is a little agenda and a public service announcement, as well, and harking back to the days when we had to be proper agricultural story editor and all of that information being plowed into the programme. So that was formally ended a long time ago because the programme, the BBC used to get money from the Ministry of Agriculture to support the archers and for the using it to get out good farming practice. But that money dried up at the end of 1970. And so the archers have been purely entertainment since the beginning of 1971. And so any issues, any campaigns, anything that they bring to the programme is very much at the behest of the editor of the day. And so we had Sean O'Connor being very keen on this coercive control storyline. We've had Jeremy Howe with the modern slavery stuff. But those are not public service announcements in the traditional sense of government telling the BBC to put stuff out. But you've got to see this stuff, yes. Well, it's interesting because that means, so that would have ended in, if it was 1971, I'd have been six then. But my memory of the archers is all the way when I was listening to it from being in my mother's womb. I don't remember the details. But all of that was that every week we learned something new. I always consider that everything I know about farming has all been from listening to the archers up until the point where I'd watch some of Jeremy Clarkson's farming programme. And all about the things that he was being forced to do by the weather recognitions are. So yeah, those are my two views on farming. The archers has always been about farming. That's why it was an everyday story of country folk and is now from temporary drama in a rural setting. I think there could be even more farming than there is. But for instance, the business with Dutch farm going organic was very much a big farming story. It was contemporary at the time. It was with the zeitgeist, but it was not in any way so government approved message because it definitely not. Absolutely not at that point. I remember it being very controversial. And it might indeed have been a chance for the programme to demonstrate its independence from math propaganda, some of which I think led to issues the whole business of ripping out hedgerows and the big farms and so forth. And all of that. And home farm under Brian, all that was post when it was in the public service days. It was Brookfield on the one hand as the model farm and the one that was adopting modern ways and the likes of Walter Gabriel as the old style bad farmer. And then since that ended, we've had the organic farming. We've had the new bad farmers being the grundies who weren't around in the early 70s. And we've had the mega farming firstly home farm and then Barrow in its two big incarnations as cows, mega dairy and then as a big place. And then we've had other things like anaerobic digesters have been an issue that's been brought in. But all of that has been about what's been of life concern in the countryside. No till drilling being the latest example of that. And that going back to Brian and the dodgy chemicals and the stuff with Timate and all the stuff buried in the barn, all of which I've clearly taken a big interest in because it's what I talk about for a living. And yeah, it's definitely of its moment when you look at a snapshot at any point in time of what else is going on in the world, really makes it great. Yeah, all kinds of rural crime has been featured from horse make, mucilation, which is not the horrible crime. As you say, Timate with his dodgy chemicals, Ryan burying those chemicals in the ground, fly tipping. There's a big fly tipping story a while back. All of those things are reflected. But it's not as a public service announcement. It's because they are giving you the depth and realism that we left the program for. And we do. And we do indeed. Now, as we've mentioned a few times before, Patreon backers have dumped you down. Get an ad free version of the podcast. After positive feedback from our patrons, we're now aiming to make the Patreon version available from around 6pm on Saturday. This is not however a guarantee. There may be weeks when other demands on my time means that I can't do the editing till later. And as I've warned a few times, this is very likely to happen on the 7th of September. That's two weeks away when I will be off as soon as we finish recording to find Ed and his textiles at the Moreton & Marsh show. And I've even bought my ticket for that now. Patrons also get a weekly email about dumped you down with the archers. And we're looking at more special features for those of you who are willing and able to support us in this way. If there's anything you think we might be able to provide as bonus material, particularly if it will make the difference between backing us and not packing us, please do let us know. All the money from Patreon goes towards covering the costs of making the podcast, including the subscriptions for the Virtual Studio and the editing tools that Steven uses. We're planning any extra, we'll go towards a dump to dump get together. The more of you sign up, the quicker we'll be able to put the get together together and patrons will have priority access to tickets. Please do because I want to see lots of lovely people. Let's move on to Facebook and give a warm, dump to dump welcome to the following people who have joined our Facebook group the past week. Elwin Evans, Kilhill, Nikki B Lynch, Pepper Hyam, Ian Pick, Andy Walker, Suzanne Robinson, Stuart Lee, Mitch Richards, Liz Jowelski, or Jowelski, however you say it, and Maggie McDonald. Welcome all you newbies. Please don't be shy about joining in. Never hesitate to start a new conversation. We actively encourage you to go full immersion and stop posting colour in a ring and email in a ring, all in the same week if you can. So let's hear what's been going on in the dump to dump Facebook this week with a roundup from Vicki. Hello everyone, this is Vicki with a quick roundup of the Facebook page. I'm calling in after Thursday's episode. I'm not able to call this in after the Friday episode this week, so apologies that I will miss all your wise, wonderful, or maybe wild ideas about who George is bringing with him back to Ambridge. Hazel Chowcat asked for suggestions. She thought Hazel Woolley. Helen Blackburn thought Clive Horribin or Alf Grundy. Our Stevens thought Keith Horribin. But Clive is the winner in this particular thread with more votes from Julie Williams, Tessa Herring and Andy Miles. Sally Ann Stacey suggested Kirsty's Philip, but I thought he was still in prison. I can't remember what his sentence was and time goes so fast these days, maybe he's out. A couple of days earlier, the George speculation was all about who he had rung asking for help. Sarah Ferguson points out that friends are thin on the ground for George and Jackie McGinty thought it couldn't have been anyone who knows George well as he had to sort of introduce himself. Lots of this, including Jean Bell, Jackie Faire, Rosie Taylor and Kate Lyle, sought his rung back to Bartleby and Meg. Although Paul Broomhead and Leslie Southgate sought out, Kate Hardy, Rory, Liz Newman suggested Tilly Button, T-Brown Artivist CA sought Miles Tichner. Wilder Slights of Fancy Still from Glenn Fullalove, who said Nelson Gabriel and Liz Biz Diz came up with scruff for the Ambridge Ferry. Speaking of the Ambridge Ferry, will they be in magical housing action again soon? After Thursday's talk about Roy selling the house, there will need to be a game of musical houses. Much discussion is ensued. Could Jim move into Jazza's room in the extension so Alistair and Denise could have the main house? Or maybe they could have the extension? That was from Victoria Bourne. Denise moving in with Kirsty has pleased some of us, for example Nicola McIntyre. Now that Willow Sarm is to be sold, perhaps Alistair could buy it, but does he still have financial problems left over from his gambling days, wonders Helen Peters? And is it too soon for Denise to be moving in with Alistair anyway? Amanda Hutton, Catherine Langley and Sandra D. Jenkins and thinks so. Barbara Williams thinks Kirsty could go back to her house at Beechwood and Helen could find somewhere else, although John McGee says it may still have too many bad memories of Philip. Leslie Hay's solution to that is just get Alan to step up and bless the house purging the nasty vibes and spirits, as he's not exactly busy doing much else. Rene Mortlock says they can move into number one the green soon when Will, George and Emma all get sent to prison? Well, my head is in a whirl with all of that, so I'll stop now and we'll wait for the ambridge ferry to get on with it. Please join the Facebook group if you haven't already, have a look at all the brilliant suggestions we come up with and join in if you can. Till next time, bye bye. Thank you Vicky and thank you so much to everyone on the dumb to dumb Facebook group. If you'd like to join them please do, but don't forget to answer all the membership questions so that we know that you're a real person and if anybody out there would like to write us a review, please do. There's a link to instructions on how to do this in the show notes. If you can't leave a review or if you already have, the other thing you could do is tell three of your friends about us. Even if they are not currently archers listeners, who knows it might be the start of a long obsession, now to Twitter, where you will find us @dumptydum. Make sure you include the archers hashtag using a capital T and A, so the visually impaired we use screen readers can enjoy any archers based tweets. As well as @dumptydum, I can occasionally be found at Wenlock House. And I can be found at @queenortort. We can both also be found with the archers friends on Blue Sky and I am Queenortort at vsky.socialware and I am at wenlock.vsky.social. So let's find out who has won the Twitter medals this week. Hello Sue, Stephen and Dumptydum is everywhere. It's purple pumpkin here with treats and skates of the week and my thanks as ever to everyone who tags @dumptydum to make sure we see all the best one. There's a growing posse on blue sky pointing to great threads for which my heartfelt thanks. This week on Twitter and Blue Sky we seemed equally divided between those on the one hand who knew George would chat with Uncle Clive and on the other those who know nothing about Clive and his backstory. Among a lot of people reminiscing about the shophold up, Intimidation at Brookfield and Arson, the George and Christine Barford's house, Serena Blancheflower @allcerene.bsky.social was taken the role often filled by Brenda Selwyn and our own wenlock house in recording old and complex storylines. For example explaining that some local low-life have been stealing farm equipment and ran over Adam when trying to steal from home farm but David saw them and identified them to the police and they then got Keith I think maybe Clive to prevent David from giving evidence. There was also a lot of discussion about why Kirsty couldn't afford to rent the whole of Roy's house given that she owned the Beechwood house where Helen and her boys live. Did everyone forget while casting Kirsty as about to be made homeless by Roy's sale of his house? As 90 at 90 said it's special Kirsty economics. She owns the house that she rents out to Helen who can afford it on one income now that she hurriedly out. Presumably that covers Kirsty's mortgage. Kirsty then rents from Roy and her employment at the rewilding means she can afford just 50 percent but Viv O'Connor at Munster made pointed out that the archers is a totally parallel universe where jobs and house rentals just seem to crop up at the drop of a hat. But enough about the ambridge housing fairy, for now it's over to this week's medals for blue sky skates and ex-posts all of which we continue to consider as Tweets of the Week. In bronze position it's ICON at ICON with some breaking news. There's a scheduled gap in tonight's Democratic National Convention schedule and the special guest is only known by a handful of people. Apparently it's George from the archers. The silver medalist is Bob Hawkins @bobhorkins.bsky.social I hope they don't tell Auntie cardboard about Clive returning to ambridge. She'll fold. And the gold medal goes to Ian Roberts @slowbikeean.bsky.social No Emma, it's not the right thing. It couldn't be more obviously the wrong thing if Liz Truss was suggesting it. And on that political note, that's it for this week. I will be out of contact for a couple of weeks back in mid-September and I hope to see you all on #TheArchers on Twitter or Blue Sky. Thank you for that Theo and congratulations to all who are mentioned in this week's roundup. As Theo said, she's going to be away for the next couple of weeks so we are looking for a volunteer to do a roundup of activity on Twitter and New Sky. So if anybody would like to volunteer, please get in touch in any of the ways that you might get in touch with us. And don't forget we are on Instagram @dumbdydumb where we or particularly Shataleen. It's starting to be a bit more active and on that note, please send any the archers or podcast relevant photographs or other images to the #dumbtydumb email and we will publish them with credits to you at www.dumbtydumb@mail.com So Shataleen will be back next week and she and Steve will be recording at their normal time of crack of dawn on Saturday morning. So please get your calls in by midnight on Friday, UK time as usual. And as we come to the end of this episode, we need to say thanks to all our wonderful contributors and to the team of #dumbtydumbers behind the scenes. And we need to say a great big thank you to all of you who are listening to us too. We love making this podcast and sharing our love of the archers around the world. And we must say thank you to Kim Durham and Sunny Ormond for their voices and to our podcasting parents Lucy V. Freeman and Rochelle Brown. Thank you so much for listening and joining us today and can I say especially thank you for having me. So we're now off to guess the weight of the piglet. So it's goodbye from me. And it's goodbye from me. Discover Hydro, the best kept secret in fitness. Hydro is the state of the art at home rower that engages 86% of your muscles delivering the ultimate full body workout in just 20 minutes. From advanced to beginner, Hydro has over 500 classes shot worldwide and taught by Olympians and world-class athletes. For a 30-day risk-free trial go to hydro.com and use code ROW450 to save $450 on a Hydro Pro Rower. That's H-Y-D-R-O-W.com code ROW450. If there's one thing that my family and friends know me for, it's being an amazing gift-giver. 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