On the day we were scheduled to take on this task for Mr J, I needed to do a training run of 50 minutes. My thought process went thus:

Instead of doing my run, going home, and going out again, I should just run there > yes that's more efficient and in the spirit of Goodgym > but I don't want to arrive all tired and hungry, I should have a break between finishing the run and arriving > ooooh I wonder if Miriam fancies getting breakfast with me before the mission

I was delighted to get the reply "That would be lovely Bekah" with a big smile and so we had a plan. On my run it was lovely to bump into fellow Goodgymmer Aatefa, who was just finishing up Parkrun at Princes Park, both of us representing GG in the iconic red t-shirts. Miriam and I met at a lovely local place, Little Owl Cafe, and had a great breakfast and a catch up before the mission. But then it was time to get to work and, refreshed, we headed over to Mr J's.

Mr J had moved from a 4-bedroom house to a flat, and although he'd tried to cull some things, inevitably has more belongings than space. Our task was to make the floor space a little safer, and move things around so Mr J can access them and therefore sort through them and continue his clear out.

Mr J showed us the bedroom and explained the problem: a) there were boxes too high and inaccessible for him to reach, b) there were boxes blocking his chests of drawers, and c) the boxes were blocking a chair he ideally wanted to use for his computer desk. As there were so many boxes around, it was a bit of a crystal maze challenge working out where we could make space to start moving things. We cleared the dining table, to then put other boxes on the dining table, to make space in a corner which we'd then utilise more effectively with boxes from the bedroom. Some of the boxes were super heavy, and Miriam put me to shame by casually carrying some I'd declared to be a 2-person job. As we worked, Mr J explained he used to have extremely useful storage space under the bed, which he could easily access despite his mobility challenges, but someone had given him a spare mattress which now took up all that space. Our ears pricked up at this and we both felt getting that space back would be a real help to Mr J. Lifting the bed and removing the mattress underneath was for sure this time a 2-person job but we did well, with my eagle eyes spotting the perfect place to store the mattress and Miriam's tactical thinking on how to manoeuvre the mattress there.

We returned to the living room with 4 pieces of good news for Mr J. The chests of drawers were now accessible, the chair was by the computer, the ottoman had been moved and could be used for easy access storage, and he had his under bed storage back. Mr J took a look and was delighted with the improvements. We then cleared some recycling for him which had built up and took it out to the recycling bins outside, and had a re-organise of the living room to get Mr J his dining table back and make the floor space just a little bit safer.

Soon time was up. This was a mission where to the untrained eye you wouldn't necessarily see a big difference. But it made an improvement in Mr J's day-to-day and that's the important thing, and it'll also enable him to progress with his clear out.