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Oxford
Start the week well with Meat-Free Monday
Going meat-free one day a week can make a world of difference for the planet and our future, so today’s GoodGym Advent Calendar suggestion is to give Meat Free Monday a go.
For some vegetarian and vegan recipe inspiration, check out:
meatfreemondays.com/our-recipes/
Oxford
GOODGYM ADVENT DAY 17 - Refill Shopping for Christmas
Have you ever thought about using your empty jars and containers to do your shopping?
In Oxford, there are several refill shops where you can take your own containers to fill up on food such as pasta, rice, cereals, nuts, coffee, tea, herbs and spices. There are also places to fill up on laundry detergents and other toiletries too, many of which are provided by SESI.
For Day 17 of the Goodgym Oxford advent calendar, we are inviting your to try these out. OxUnboxed is located at 36 Little Clarendon Street, Oxford OX1 2HU and is open 10-6 during the day (Thursday-Sunday but do check before going). It is run solely by volunteers so if you are able and willing to help out, do contact the staff at Oxford Hub to find out more. They also have recycling boxes provided by Terracycle if you have any bread bags or crisp packets to dispose of.
Another option is Flo's Refill Shop, which is located in Florence Park next to the cafe at Rymer's Lane, Oxford, OX4 3JZ. They are open 11-7 on a Friday so do pop in to see what goodies you can pick up (and to try the excellent cakes they have in the cafe).
There are refill stations at the East Oxford Farmers' and Community Market too on a Saturday morning, some of which need pre-ordering before going to pick up so check that out too.
In Marston, the Eco Hub also has a small refill station for oil and household products.
If you know of any other refill shops and stations, do use them and spread the word!
Oxford
Masked crusaders
The John Radcliffe Hospital is the main Accident and Emergency centre for Oxfordshire, and provides acute medical and surgical services. It is the largest of Oxford's hospitals, covering around 66 acres, including the Children's Hospital, Eye Hospital, Heart Centre, Women's Centre, blood donor centre and many other services. The John Radcliffe site is home to the Oxford University Medical School and the base for most medical students who are trained throughout the Oxford University Hospitals Trust.
All this makes the hospital site very busy, with lots of footfall from students, staff, patients and visitors. And sadly, with people comes litter. The Estates team can't possibly be expected to keep such a large site litter free alongside everything else they do, so tonight we trialled a GoodGym litter pick to see if we could make a difference.
We met on the outskirts of the hospital site, briefed everyone on safety policies, divided into teams, tooled up with bags and pickers and then set off to clean up. One of our teams headed up the hill to the main entrance, another went along the path towards the blood donation centre, a 3rd team cleaned up outside the West Wing and Children's hospital, and our final team concentrated on the car parks.
Masks were the most regular find tonight.
They were everywhere....in the hedges, under cars, by bus stops. LOTS of cigarette butts too, and (oddly) a huge stash of cider cans in one of the car parks - did someone have a party in the car park?! Hats, hoodies and gloves were all found, but astonishingly NO PANTS. We even had a few appreciative comments and 'thank yous' from passersby.
We collected 18 large sacks of rubbish, a broken umbrella, a large box, and a folded mattress-y thing, and lugged them all off the hospital land for collection by Oxford Direct Services.
Well done everyone - the litter is an eyesore, as well as potentially dangerous, so it's great that we managed to clear up so much of it tonight.
Oxford
It’s beginning to look a bit like Christmas
#NeverMissAWednesday
Our Wednesday shift at the food bank was a little bit different this week. A shortage of delivery drivers meant that most of the food parcels went out on the van round before we got there, leaving us just 6 Emergency Parcels to prepare and a handful to finish up from the regular delivery list. This gave us a bit more time than usual to train up new parcel-packers, which was very helpful.
Rachael turned up laden with a food donation from the parents of another GoodGymer, which we added to a parcel going to someone we know is struggling to get enough to eat at the moment. We then worked our way through the packing lists, delivered 2 food parcels locally, and did restocking and reorganising of the hall shelves and kitchen.
Rachael and Anna got some early festive spirit going sorting through Christmas gift donations, categorising them by age of recipient and making an inventory. Let the Christmas madness commence!
Oxford
Double trouble for Home Library Service
Due to changes in timings and me being away with work, there was a double dose of library deliveries today. A stack of science books were collected to Mr D and a small selection of murder mysteries were picked out for Mrs M. Both seemed very pleased with the bumper haul and I'll see them again before Christmas!
Oxford
Preparing Food parcels 24.11.21
We have 2 tasks tonight. This is the early shift at Oxford Mutual Aid, and there will also be a task litter picking the John Radcliffe Hospital site starting at 6:15pm. It would be feasible to make it to both if you want a full evening of GoodGyming.
We will be based inside Richard Benson Hall preparing food parcels in the food bank and helping the delivery drivers load them into their cars. We will do some restocking of the shelves too if there's time.
Please wear a mask. Anwen will be at the hall from about 4pm, so feel free to turn up any time between 4pm and 4:30pm.
Oxford
Frish Fresh
Some hardy Goodgymers braved slightly chilly weather to volunteer at Florence Park and Harcourt Hill Junior Parkruns.
Anwen and I then ran a lovely trail route over some fields and through the woods enjoying the autumn colours. Maybe a route for a future Goodgym walk??
Oxford
Vaccine marshalling
Helped direct the queues and aid any patients requiring an extra helping hand for East Oxford Medical Centre. Very efficient work by a trusty cohort of volunteers and vaccinators!
Oxford
Junior Park Run - Florence Park (ADVENT DAY 5)
Helping Junior Park run in Florence Park!
We will marshal, tail walk, bar code scan, clap and cheer the kids.
Trev is Run Director. If you want a task other than Marshall please say, also please do let Trev have your parkrun Barcode to get a parkrun volunteer credit.
If you haven't been before we meet at the bench in the middle of the park at 8:30am. Junior Parkrun is normally finished and packed away soon after 9:30am
If you can’t make it this week why not register to volunteer at Junior Parkrun Florence Park or Harcourt Hill another week, or register to help at grown up parkrun (Saturday morning 9am)? You can find your local runs and register as a runner or volunteer here.
Oxford
No one could COP out of our Good Rose Hill litter pick!
What a lot of litter!
Helping Rose Hill and Iffley Low Carbon 17 runners, walkers and cyclists met at Rose Hill Community Center where Trev and Katherine from RHILC explained how we can help the environment by clearing up our litter.. or in this case Rose Hills!...
no strangers to mess the last time we were in Rose Hill in April we cleared an amazing amount from under the bridge Watch the video if you missed it!! Trev initially was worried there wasn't much to be picked on this Wednesday evening in November... how wrong he was!...
So splitting into group, we covered streets around the Oval, Rivermead Road, Spencer Crescent and Asquith Road, and the Southern Bypass (a little futher along that last time!). The estate is now looking spick and span but there is still quite a bit on the Bypass (why do people chuck rubbish from their cars? or even bag whole bags of rubbish or clothes and not take it to... a bin!!!)
Pant, yes! Shopping Trolleys, tick! Pumpkin, indeed.. Mog the forgotten cat, aww.... serial killer in the paper, aahhhhhh!!! we got a bit of everything! Thanks especially to the committed GGers who were stuck on the A34 on the way to the task.. no COPing out though and even Bethan and Lorenzo joined us in the end! Top picking commitment guys!
Welcome back Chloe and Jack on your second GG Tasks!
If you would like to know more about RHILC, or to get involved please do goto the website, sign up to the mailing list or let Trev know!
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