This week's task was led by fellow GoodGymer, Paul, who had signed up to the Surfers Against Sewage Million Mile Clean - equipping us with some professional litter-picking garb and turning us into bona fide citizen scientists. The mission? To clear (a corner of) Finsbury Park of litter, and play a bit of brand bingo - submitting data on which brands were littering our park.

Steph Ducat, Louise, Da Marcus, and Mehmet ran down from Arsenal Community Hub together, meeting the others at the South East gates of Finsbury Park to get started on the task.

Since becoming a run leader, I've wanted to re-start the old warm-up ritual of doing a register, each person saying their name and then answering a random question. Finally, it began last night - and with a question that turned out to be more apt than I'd realised: "what's your favourite drink?".

Paul, who's preferred tipple is JD & Coke, managed to find not one but three (sadly empty) bottles of Jack Daniels littered around the park's borders; and Louise, who favours Strongbow Dark Fruits, also hit her jackpot, as did Da Marcus with a can of Iced Tea. Sadly I didn't find any kombucha bottles littered around Finsbury Park... 😆

We were treated to an incredible red sunset, and even attracted some questions from other park users about how they could get involved and host similar litter picks in their areas.

Altogether we collected 5 sacks of litter, collectively walking 5.6 miles as we picked - in Paul's words: "legendary stuff 🙌🏻!"

There was lots of excitement for next week's session building paths in Caledonian Park - see you there?

Back at Mrs H, which I have been a couple of times to cut the grass in her front and back garden, trim her tree around the door entrance and do some path weeding. What else could need attention apart from the grass needing a small trim as regrown? Small refresh done!! The pond and rock feature needed attention as hijacked by bindweed, brambles, grass and wild flowers. You could not see the rock feature. Mrs H did some tea as said I needed to stay hydrated in this heat and work session. Had a visit from my friend the robin once again and am sure the robin thought it was dinner time. The rock feature is now visible and Mrs H said her husband spent loads of time keeping it looking nice when he was still alive and would be happy looking at it today. Bless her. Then I started removing weed more weed on the slabbed path that goes all the way to the back cabin.

Back to Mr P as he had more plants to plant in the back garden but also some rhubarb to be replanted in a different location. First task for me was to move a iron wigwam from the front garden to the back which moved several times until Mr P was happy with new location. Then Mr P wanted to replant his rhubarb plant that was solidly stuck and anchored in a wheelbarrow. I had to move stuff around to dig a massive hole to replant the whole rhubarb plantation next to his rose plant. I relocated also the gnome and its home with the rhubarb as it was also living in the wheelbarrow. As Mr P had some plants to be put in the back garden, it was decided that 6 of them would settle in a colorful bucket under in the wigwam. While I was digging and planting, Mr P who is known for his poems started reading one to me which was based on his "Peace Garden". Once done and new plants watered, I had a new task as Mr P was not decided where to put the other small new plants. Yes I had the impression I was doing Ikea furniture as Mr P had a new wooden bird home...in pieces!!I had to put it together with no instructions, just based on a photo on the box. The birds can now come and rock in their new home.

Sunny Sunday morning and I went to Mr R, one of our regulars. He was overwhelmed that Goodgymers give up their Sunday to go and volunteer at peoples homes and he was very thankful. I was back to sort his back garden as did the front recently. He has a massive garden : 30 meters on 15 meters which the foxes appreciate. Mr or Mrs Fox was there playing when I went walked in. I started getting rid of all the weed and brambles. This time I didn't see any other animals apart from a fox, bumble bees and birds...no frogs this time. I did find the usual tennis balls from the neighbors. I did go through a lot of string on the strimmer as a lot to go through. No strings attached between the tool and the garden.

Today was also the London Marathon and a lot of people reached personal milestones. I had one for myself today as Goodgym - the mission means I have reached 1000 good deeds in just under 3 years...more to come.

It's not often a task finishes before it's begun, but due to an early finish to the youth gig and typically efficient work by the Hanwell Hootie volunteers and Goodgym, we were home 5 minutes before the task was meant to start!

Following a successful gig organised by the Terry Marshall Academy, featuring rising star singer-songwriter Michael Hill, Steph and I sprang into action and stacked the chairs in the hall in quick time. Then it was off to the kitchen to put the empties into the bin and tow the leftover drinks to a storage area. Before long, Sevan and Kash joined us to super charge the tidy up and we were done in no time. Everyone was happy to get home early, not least one of the volunteers who had been there since 7am!

Sunny afternoon in Westminster : both Mourad and Steph Ducat joined Gurseva to provide food to the homeless. Tables out, food out and the Goodgymers started to dish the lovely veggie biryani into take away containers. Customers also had some cookies and some hot drinks like chocolate, tea and coffee. We also handed out some caps to protect them from the sun. Rice and shine : people enjoyed the food and the sun.

Ahead of the Hanwell Hootie main event on the 9th of May, there were 2 warm up sessions today. One was for the volunteers, to brief them ahead of the big day and the second was a Youth Stage, giving a show case to bands from the Terry Marshall Academy. Both were taking place in the Hobbayne Centre and GoodGym were on hand to set up the main hall for the 2 different events.

Cool Runnings

Essential for the Youth Stage was to have a working bar and essential for a successful bar was to have ice. There was no ice, so Iram went on a supermarket run with a Hobbayne member. They stocked up the freezer and the beer buckets, ensuring that perfectly chilled drinks would be served to the gig goers.

Centre Stage

Kash, Steph and Sevan were tasked with setting out seats for the volunteers. they had to guesstimate where the stage, bar and walkways would be. The stage was the biggest problem. One of the organisers imagined where the drummer, guitarists would be positioned and where the singer would stand centre stage. The first row of seats was positioned around that, with the team setting out the chairs in semi-circles, so that it would feel like a mini theatre.

Setting a High Bar

With the bar drinks chilling on ice, someone tall had to put the BAR sign up to attract the punters. As the tallest person on site, Steph took on the job, stretching high to place the sign out of reach of any flying beer glasses.

Voluntees Table

At the other end of the hall, Iram was helping to line up the t-shirts for volunteers. They each had names stuck to them and were grouped by size. It was a great system, except that the tables were way too small for the number of volunteers and t-shirts. That meant that Iram had to organise and shuffle the groups a lot. The GoodGymers made Iram's task a little bit easier by taking their own tees home, freeing up precious space.

Banner Manner

The final task for Kash, Steph and Sevan was to get the freshly delivered banners for the Terry Marshall Academy displayed inside and outside the hall. There were a lot of cable ties available. They still needed to work out how to use them creatively to show off the banners in the best way possible battling to get the hanging without folds or overlaps. Speaker brackets, dumbbells and railings were all called into action to make sure the signs stayed up and stayed visible, with the end result looking pretty professional and not at all put together by a bunch of (talented) amateurs.

Back In Black

After all of the fun today, GoodGym will be back after dark to tidy up again. They'll be removing all signs of the sensible volunteers and wild rock and roll that took place in the hall today.

Arrived at Mrs I to be welcomed by some tea and cake to start. I was nicely surprised that the entrance was free of bags and seems that a first collection was done during the week. More space for us to put bags as 2nd collection arranged for beginning of May. We then started sorting and filling more bags. Loads of space in the conservatory and we started sorting the cupboards. Mrs I cant believe the amount of items she has accumulated over the years but happy that we have gone through the decluttering.