Helter Shelter

2 Goodgymmers burnt the midnight oil as they spent the night helping out at Shelter From The Storm.

Once Bitten, Twice Dry

Sam and Gramps braved the Friday evening rain and were very pleased to be literally sheltered from the storm as they arrived at the SFTS residential building for their overnight shift.

They were welcomed by Karen, the experienced SFTS volunteer tasked with joining our two Goodgymmers through the night.

Karen, a lovely fountain of boundless interesting chat, walked us through the tasks for the evening and gave us a tour of the lovingly converted car garages that are now a very chic residential building.

SFTS is a residential shelter for homeless individuals, part of the Housing Justice Night Shelters, offering free accommodation and warm meals to up to 36 guests 365 days every year. With no recourse to public funding, the shelter is funded entirely by donations and relies on volunteers to keep the doors open.

That's where we came in! Sam and Gramps started their shift at 9pm and tasks for the night included: fighting each other for dirty mugs to clean, pleading with some rather sluggish washer dryers, doing a couple of fire exits checks, warming up meals cooked by the evening shift volunteers for guests who arrived late from work, chatting endlessly, and breaking into Sam's emergency biscuits reserves.

All in all, it was a very quiet night. With most of the guests in work, early nights are all the rage at SFTR and the biggest challenge our goodgymmers faced were the aforementioned washer dryers. You'll never look at yourself in the mirror the same way after you've caught yourself whispering invocations and prayers to an inanimate machine at 4am in the morning. Anyway, even with those, we got there in the end and all guests had their clothes washed, all towels sorted, and bed linen lined up for a new day. Boom

SFTS are always looking for volunteers for their overnight shifts, especially on the weekends so if you can spare an evening or two a month (and are DBS checked), get in touch with Gramps on euclides@goodgym.org and he'll be happy to arrange a shift for you!