Miss S from Chiswick had broken her back during the pandemic, which affected her life in many ways. Not only could she no longer hike or play tennis. Bending her back became out of the question, unless she was ready to spend 30 minutes trying to get back to standing upright. This lack of mobility had led Miss S to accumulate piles of magazines, mail, leaflets or even food packaging on the floor in her living room. With time, islets of papers became islands, islands became continents, and, eventually, a supercontinent of clutter swallowed all the floor space in between.

One Sunday morning, Sevan and Kash, the movers and shakers of decluttering, visited Miss S to introduce some continental drift into the lady's living room. The ultimate goal was to regain access to the back garden to have it cleared, with green waste removed through the house.

In 90 minutes allocated to the task, the GoodGymers separated the tectonic plates of clutter into:

• General waste - those seamlessly drifted into the black bin
• Recyclables - as above, but with a blue wheelie bin as the destination
• Paperwork - a bag of unopened mail formed a dreadful island that Miss S will have to go through at some point
• Unopened bottles of Sanpellegrino water - they formed a delightful peninsula full of alpine mineral springs
• Unopened orange juice bottles at varying stages of decay - deported in a bag to a quarantine island, to be disposed of later
• Cash in coins and notes - where else could those have landed if not on a small treasure island?
• Books - primarily about bridge, but not exclusively, formed a volcanic island with two peaks towering over other land that emerged in the process
• Useful stuff - kitchen gloves, bin bags, a towel, a bottle of wine and other things that may come in handy in the future formed their own continent in an unassuming M&S tote bag

One bag of forgotten baby Jersey potatoes deserves a special mention for literally turning into liquid, producing terrifying sulfur compounds that could be smelled without even opening the bag! That volcanic island drifted straight into the outside bin before a potential eruption of dreadful consequences.

Eventually, a sea of clear floor formed in the middle of the living room. It seemed as if a meteor impact had formed a crater as impressive as the Gulf of Mexico, pushing the remaining unsorted clutter towards the walls. Was Sevan's and Kash's help like a meteor that came to Miss S's life from outer space? We are not sure - but there certainly has been a big impact!

Today was thankfully cooler than our last visit to Acton Junior parkrun. Either due to that or more of the runners not being away on their summer holidays, there were a few more finishers today and by the next time we're here, schools will be back and they should return to the normal numbers of children 🤞.

For today's run, Maria took centre stage, leading the warm up session again. Steph, Kash and Sevan marshalled around the course, Chris took on the role of timekeeper and Maria completed the circle of parkrun, being at the start and the end, by scanning barcodes too.

Sevan paired up with a new-to-Acton marshal at the roundabout and showed them how and when the children would appear at their marshal point. He also tried to explain the complicated course layout, which is still indescribable. Is it like a snail? 🐌 Some of the new children didn't get it either, needing the marshals to point them in the right direction to get them to the finish. They'll have learned from the guidance and will know what to do next time.

Kash and Steph Ducat were up early to meet at Ealing Broadway Station for a short and chatty run to Acton Junior Parkrun. After a warm up, the two runners went through the quite streets of Ealing towards to park. We said we will take it easy...but did we?!Both feeling comfy and chatting away, we then noticed that we were on a good pace....yes zooming through the streets! In no time we were in the park for some stretching before we tackled our roles at Acton Junior Parkrun. So nearly 3.5km in just over 18 minutes. Flash ⚡⚡⚡

Another visit at Mrs A as the back garden is huge but getting clearer every week end. Mrs A was taken to hospital during the week, but her son was there to allow me to carry on with the garden. Mrs A is ok and been looked after, so it will be great for her to come back to a finished garden.

What other treasures could I find in the overgrown garden? Yes more golf balls, flower pots, a tree trunk and a old fashion mower that you push to cut the grass. But there was something else hidden in the brambles and bindweed : part of an engine. When I told Mrs A son, he said wow, that from dads Cortina. That was a car back in the day!!!

We now can clearly see the fence and the back of the garage is clearly opened up. More grapes have appeared as the invasive plants have been removed.

Just the lunch shift for me today at Ealing Soup Kitchen. It was 34 degrees outside and felt very warm in the kitchen! Chef John prepared beef chili with a vegetarian alternative and it was a popular meal - lots of clean plates being returned. I was on serving duties again and we were kept busy with a constant request for cold drinks. Another successful lunchtime with happy and replete clients.

It's been over 50 consecutive days - and counting - without any rain in some parts of London, and Western Road Urban Garden in Southall required a constant effort from Janpal and volunteers to help the site keep up with the ongoing heat. The exotic vegetables inside the polytunnel were doing well, and the veg plot we had cleared, woodchipped and partially planted only a month ago started already producing crops such as aubergines and tomatoes! None of that came without a price. Manual watering of veg beds took a lot of time and energy and wouldn't be sustainable in the long term. That's something the architect of Western Road community garden Ash wanted to address for a while.

In February this year, we had taken first steps towards executing Ash's vision of installing two 1000-litre rainwater containers. The mud wasn't going to serve as a reliable base for a tonne of water in a single container, so after digging out the soil, we'd been looking forward to pouring the concrete into the square spaces for a few months. Today was the day to make Ash's vision reality!

Seven GoodGymers came to support Western Road on a Saturday morning in August:

• Walkers: Angela
• Runners: Sevan and Kash
• Cyclists: Scott, Amy and Steph
• Cyclists/parkrunners: Richard

The Plant Squad

Angela, Amy and Janpal had plenty of tasks to do: from weeding the bed alongside the polytunnel, to harvesting and watering the new veg plot. In the polytunnel, they discovered a watermelon that looked pretty good on the outside, but a closer look revealed a small hole and the fact that the fruit was half eaten inside! Judging by the size of the hole, it looked like a rat, rather than Mr Fox, was the prime suspect this time. To save the other juicy crops, Janpal ordered the harvesting of the green tomatoes before the rat laid its eyes on them. Amy found some very long chili peppers, and everyone had a chance to see ripe snake gourds.

Janpal's top tip for cooking a snake gourd:

"Make sure to take the skin off and discard the seeds. We haven't done it last time, and that was the most bitter thing I've ever had!"

The Concrete Cowboys

The group keen to learn concreting skills joined Ash and started with combining the mixture for a base for the water container:

• 4 parts shingle
• 2 parts coarse sand
• 1 part cement
• plasticiser.

While Steph, Richard and Sevan mixed the concrete in a tray to wheelbarrow it to the destination hole surrounded by a wooden frame, Scott, Kash and Ash cleared the weeds inside and around the frame, assisted with pouring the mix, then levelled and tamped the concrete.

The team used up all the resources allocated for one of the bases, then threw in some rubble to bulk up the base, but there wasn't enough material to finish off that stage of the project. Despite great teamwork and solid progress, we'll need to come back to finish off the job when more materials are available. Join us next Wednesday!