I was up in Oxford last week with my daughter and the freshers were just relaxing, chillin' out ( that's what they say isn't it) and finding their way around.

Met a lovely young guy with his mum and his accompanying guide dog. He was a music student and the duo were taking in the atmosphere and the new smells. We were stood right outside Lush and close to a wonderful coffee shop near the North tower so perfumes were abundant.
We had my daughters trainee guide dog puppy with us too so we all had a good old natter. So much for not interrupting guide dogs while they are working...

What did you study?

sounds great. I really feel you can be energised by visiting a university town (in the daytime!). Bright young things everywere - there's a buzz.

Love Oxford. Love Cambridge more. It's more compact. The vernacular background architecture is very east anglia - but then socking great colleges everywhere. I love the whole sweep of them from Magdalene down to Peterhouse

Classics (and Theology)

Nice, more of a science-girl myself, so can't really make a more appropriate response.

I started to chat up a girl at a uni disco once but slipped up when I thought she meant she was a student surveyor when she said she was taking theology.

My friend did Theology at Oxford (St Edmund Hall). Smartarse got a first, as well.

He ended up being a librarian, and his parents were rather disappointed.

Classic!

Yeah theology doesn't lead anywhere specific unless you want to go into the priesthood etc. Some people I know who studied it are now city bankers, management consultants, civil servants.
I did Classics mainly.

The thing Theology seemed to do for the few students that I came across was to either turn them into or confirm them as ardent atheists

Yes maybe but ones that could think, reason, research, make connections, find relationships between seemingly disconneted bits of data, evaluate outcomes, present them cogently etc etc. Skills that we seem to no longer value as we once did.

Maybe, but Jill still behaved pretty badly imo. She came across as rude and demented.


Poor Johnny

I wonder how he'll break the news to Tom - he could buy him a foot spray and insist he uses it I suppose.

I totally agree with you and found Pip's behaviour totally unacceptable.

She is rapidly turning into an opinionated, selfish madam in the exact same vein as Helen.(To be fair, her behaviour is much better now since her ordeal.)

It's interesting that there are two opposing views on whether or not Jill should have complained or not about Toby going to her party without an invitation. I wonder if it's a generational thing? I know I wouldn't have dreamed of inviting a boyfriend along to any of my grandparents' birthdays without asking them.

It's just basic manners really! A quick check with Jill that it was OK to bring Toby to the party or at the very least to have asked Ruth to sound Jill out on the matter, would have avoided any unnecessary unpleasantness.

Pip probably should have checked if it was ok to bring Toby, but she didn't, and of course Jill had a right to object, but she needn't have been so rude to Toby, or Pip. There are polite ways of expressing most sentiments. Jill hasn't really given any good reasons for her antipathy towards Toby either.

I think the very sensible Carol Tregorran agrees with me

Jill keeps denying that it has nothing to do with Grace or Rex and Toby's father (Robin)? She had an utter dislike of Toby, so what on earth is the reason for such bitterness?

I think it's more down to personal temperment.
With some people you could have invited anyone as they are 'the more the merrier' types. Some people are more comfortable with just immediate family.
Pip probably did the wrong thing, but as she said, Jill has alwyas been supportive of her with regards to boyfriends, even when her parents weren't keen. Why would she have reason to assume Jill would be so set against Toby?

Bad form from Pip, but also a silly overreaction from Jill.

Well she may not be acknowledging the root causes for her dislike.

Or she simply not like him and view him as a player and a ner do well who has his hooks into PIp because she is the daughter of landowners he percieves to be wealthy. Or maybe that just what I think and why I don't like him.

And I really don't like him and I suspect few of you do either. Its just all our energy has been so taken up with disliking Rob, that Toby's sins have passed by in that slip stream. Mark my words he will turn out to be a bounder and a cad!

I think the latter is very true and astutely observed. Rob and Arse Hag have thoroughly eclipsed lesser rogueries. Things have gone by the wayside.
In more ordinary days the Adam/Ian fracas would have drawn in far more censure, and probably calls for Adam to get his winky jammed in the threshing machine.

I'd started to quite like Toby, and I thought he and Pip were OK together. When he told Rex that Pip had done all the running I was a bit disappointed - so cheap, and not even true as far as I can remember. I was hoping he'd properly fallen for her and they'd surprise everyone and go the distance. You're probably right though - he'll turn out to be a cad and a bounder

I drifted off and missed the last couple of lines last night. Is Adam going to try to stop Ian going to Edinburgh?

I hope the sleazy cad gets his winky caught in the threshing machine

The Archers is almost back to its old self: llama spit, the hunt, and Roy, Tom and Jazzer going out on the pull.

Life is good...
Been out of the loop for a few days so it's a treat to be back in the real world of old Archerland. I'm guessing that the normality will lose a few of the more recent "listeners"

Adam to Kate: "I wanted to be faithful......."

It wasn't just the once, Adam - what did you expect ? I hope Iain makes a go of it in Edinburgh and finds a nice faithful Scotsman to link up with.