Have you ever wondered what happens to the dead Christmas trees Ealing Council collects each January after the festive season's end? They are being sent to a cemetery. Literally.

Just as a year ago, the 2025 trees got minced into woodchip and dropped at the South Ealing Cemetery. We were going to use it to cover the side paths and disguise the sins of the last year: suspicious walkways. A year ago, the woodchip the cemetery received was rough and contained large, sharp pieces of timber, not really classifying as woodchip on which you could walk safely and comfortably. This year, having learnt lessons from 2025, the Council provided fine woodchip, mostly made of fragrant conifer needles. What a treat to shovel!

The rain might have scared off some of this morning's crew, but five GoodGymers showed up and joined Paul and two other volunteers from Ealing Parks Foundation for a 2-hour workout.

Sevan, Steph and Kash knew the drill: shovel the woodchip into a wheelbarrow, transport, tip on a path, and rake, rinse and repeat. Devi joined the shovel & wheelbarrow team with enthusiasm and grit. Despite the cemetery task being only her second session and the weather being a far cry from what we call a glorious day, Devi has proven to be a tenacious GoodGymer, enjoying an intense, non-stop activity outdoors. Great to see such a spirit!

Meanwhile, James found raking the paths thoroughly satisfying - so satisfying that he levelled every single barrow of woodchip dropped on all three paths we managed to do in the two hours allocated. Being a perfectionist and having a special connection to the green space must have helped. Great work, James!

Paul was both impressed and delighted by the number of paths woodchipped, and particularly happy to see a pathway to the Mausoleum being covered, as it was on the route of the cemetery's guided walk.

According to our data scientist Steph, each of the GoodGymers transporting the woodchip covered roughly 5km of walking with a wheelbarrow. That's not only plenty of the daily steps walked by midday, but also a fantastic impact on the calm, historic green space of South Ealing for everyone to enjoy.

Late afternoon mission in Ealing at Miss V : building flat pack dressing table. Arrived at Miss V flat after a 6km walk from my previous community mission. Struggled to find her flat as the numbers were not in order, so we met outside as her flat is hidden...even google did not find it. When getting in the flat, Miss V presented me to the beast : the flat pack box!!!Miss V did not dare open the box as was too scared of building the dressing table for her room. I opened the box and checked that nothing as damaged as was delivered earlier in the month to her flat. I sorted all the parts on the lounge floor including the screws etc but also a mirror with a light that was part of the table . Mirror mirror, who is the ....?Lets keep that for another story. Miss V had some extra tools that came in handy as the tools in the box were very basic. The brochure had loads of steps and pictures, but had to use my phone to zoom into them as some steps not very clear at all. Dressing table assembled including the mirror, then had to do the 4 drawers. One more item to assemble which Miss V insisted I show her how to do : yes the stool which we did together. All done and I was willing to stay a few more minutes in order to put the dressing table in its' location - Miss V bedroom. Tight area but perfect fit and mirror was glowing as switched the light on it on. Miss V was happy with her purchase and the assembly. You could catch a glimpse of a man in the mirror : not Michael Jackson but Steph from Goodgym and his mirror selfie.

Kash and Sevan made a return visit to Ms C's kitchen as part of her recent decluttering efforts. The kitchen table had been piled high with things on each of their visits and Ms C said that today was the day to tackle them. Kash and Sevan might even be able to convince Ms C to dispose of something... anything.

There was a whole variety of things on the table, including folders of paperwork. Ms C went to search for her shredder, followed by Kash. Sevan waited in the kitchen, and waited, and eventually the pair returned armed with some spinning blades. Everyone was now ready to get decluttering.

They worked through 1 item at a time which was slow going, finding:

• Expired medication (to be dropped off at the pharmacy)
• Old paperwork (shredded)
• Weekly tablet container (the only thing to be donated... then not)
• An ice cube tray (one of many Ms C has and another of her "fetishes")
• Other random bric-a-brac

Anything that was to be thrown away or recycled was put to one side and everything to keep or process later moved across to the hob, which turned into it's own pile of bric-a-brac. The fact that Ms C was letting things go at all was a little bit positive and even a couple of "good stuff" tins of shea butter made their way to the bin after failing the sniff test. A sign of good things to come, perhaps.

Other notable finds were a suede bra which had memories from her youth for Ms C and for some reason was sitting on the kitchen table. Kash found her passport too

"I think that's an old one" - Ms C
"No, that's your current passport. Valid to 2029"
"Best to put it somewhere safe" - Sevan

The passport too ended up on the big pile of stuff on the hob. Hopefully it won't go missing again.

The second instalment of the "Operation Pond" at The Grange Primary School saw an influx of GoodGym forces, with four Ealing regulars: Steph Ducat, Sevan, Afshin and Kash, a frequent Hounslow guest: Maxime, and three faces new to Ealing: Ines, Breda and Libi. For Libi, it was her very first GoodGym session, and she welcomed the opportunity with a constant smile.

Nova, the school's garden club teacher and the lead of the mini wetlands centre project, had several tasks today for the GoodGymers, volunteers, parents and children who joined the Saturday afternoon session. Breda, Libi, and later Sevan were digging the grass around the pond and transforming the slightly overgrown area into flowerbeds and even one raised bed, which suddenly materialised in the middle of the session (thanks to one crafty volunteer). They planted a variety of flowers and herbs, daffodils, wild garlic and spinach. Maxime was busy with a general tidy-up, litter picking, raking and wheelbarrowing leaves to the faraway compost pile, and lending a hand in multiple side-quests he kept discovering.

The biggest operation that needed the most volunteers was, of course, the pond. We were surprised to see that it was filled with some water again. Maybe it shouldn't have been so unexpected, given the recent weeks of rainy days. Armed with buckets, we quickly dried the pond to a reasonable degree, pouring the water into a tank and then into a drain on the playground. A couple of youngsters joined in, guided by their parents, and we were amazed by their enthusiasm and determination.

Between our first and second sessions at the Grange Primary School, Nova had secured several half-tonne bags of donated material for filling the pond. Gravel, sandy soil and topsoil were one ingredient for making the pond shallower. The second ingredient was the muscle. Ines, Afshin, Steph, Sevan and Kash, together with one super-strong volunteer, were shovelling the dirt, carrying bucketloads of earth, dragging and tipping really heavy bags, and moving the soil to shape a smaller pond with less steep banks. Then they moved the soil again. And again. It was hard graft, but eventually they carved a neat, muddy bowl and covered it with a liner. The other half of the old pond, which would become its own project, was separated from the new pond with a barricade made of tyres.

That was the point where we stopped, as we had run out of material to continue filling the basin and ideas on how to further improve the pond at that point. Nova was pleased with the result today, and mentioned she'd be keen to host another session with GoodGymers once she secures additional funding for the mini wetlands centre.

After task owner Tamzin's husband drove away their car at the start of today's task, it changed the list of today's jobs for the team. There were still a few new requests to prepare and most of the time would be on sorting new donations.

The incoming donations were supposed to all be women's size 10s and 12s. As well as separating the donations by size and type (top under or outer layers, plus bottoms), the team debated if some of the donations were for men or women and why men's and women's clothes had buttons on opposite sides. Apparently it was because rich women had servants to dress them, so the buttons were switched to suit the servant's dominant hand when they were face on with the buttons.

As well as sizing and categorising, the team also had to inspect the donations for damaged, dirty or inappropriate finds. They found all 3, plus men's and children's clothes in the bags, which kept them busy sorting for most of the session. The unexpected items included a leopard skin negligée and a pair of fishnets, a child's doctor's play coat and a polo shirt labelled "Jack Ryan stand in". Only the polo shirt was a necessary donation and only if they found a suitable law enforcement officer to wear it. Stranger things have happened...

Kash went to prepare the newly received requests before everyone wrapped up for a well deserved lunch.

A classic end-of-week ritual: shopping for the one and only Mr G, fuelled by browsing Nancy Cunard photos and a lively chat about rule-breaking styles of our teen years.