Four fantastic GoodGymers ran a short distance to help at Common Thread this evening. We met lovely Fran and Jess inside their building where they were ready and waiting for us. There were already many other volunteers scurrying around inside. We received a quick briefing of our tasks for the night, which included sorting bags of donations into categories, bagging them up, labeling them and taking them to be stored in the cellar. Amelia was given the very special task of designing and making a placard saying Jeans World (a reference to the Wayne's World films). What a fantastic job she did too!

After a solid hour of sifting and sorting we said our goodbyes and headed out into the night.

There was one last thing for us to do before stretching at The Showroom, a set of exercises at the amphitheatre near SHU. Using the concrete seats we did push-ups and tricep dips.

A fun evening was had by all!

Tonight we welcomed in a new GoodGymer on our run to help out the Walk Wheel Cycle Trust clear up some of the Grey to Green area. Give her a cheer here Amelia.

We met Simon and Gerry who had a plethora of litterpicking apparatus ready for us to hit the streets around the Castlegate area. We all hooped, bagged, and pickered up and set out to clean up the sustainable urban drainage systems (SUDS) which seem to collect litter as effectively as well as rainwater. There wasn't a great amount in the beds this time because the council had obviously recently been doing some green-fingered shenanigans there. We did manage to find a lot of smaller items that had been passed over by others... bottle tops, cigarette butts etc.

After a solid hour of clearing up, we deposited the 'full' bags near a bin to be reported and collected. We then gathered to pose with our trashy accomplishments for a couple of pictures, before saying our goodbye's to the Walk Wheel Cycle people.

It was now time for a bit of exercise fun, in the form of competitive wall sits and box jumps. Everyone leapt at the chance to participate! After this we headed back to the Showroom to stretch off and debrief.

Tonight five runners met Karen and some of the other pre-eminent Pitsmoor Pickers to de-litter the streets, specifically Rock Street and bits of Nottingham Street.

Upon meeting Karen, litter pickers, hoops and bags were distributed amongst us and we received a quick briefing of the areas to cover. We were to make our way methodically up Rock Street, occasionally venturing up side roads as needed, before cannily heading on to the can hot-spot of Nottingham Street. As we worked our way up the street we kept a special eye out for the glint of aluminium cans- which are separately bagged up to be recycled for cash. This cash is put straight back into the ongoing battle against litter by funding equipment for litter picking volunteers in the area. Many of the cans found had already been squished by cars, which made them extra tricky to pick up, but saved us having to flatten them ourselves. We had to kerb/curb our enthusiasm when spying rubbished that had fallen off the pavement and under cars, carefully watching out for traffic as we progressed ever upwards.

Bin there, done that!

After 45 minutes and a thoroughly solid effort from everyone involved, we piled up the full bags from the evening and posed for some photos before heading off on our merry way back down the hill into town.

When we arrived back near the Showroom we made use of one of the new university building's covered entrance areas to stretch off and debrief.

...And that's a wrap(per) for another week!

This evening we met up with Clive from AgeUK who had lots of of leaflets for us to distribute. The leaflets offer advice to older people about how to get confidential benefits and pension advice. We were given a list of streets to target, and a bundle of leaflets with two varieties. A plan was quickly developed about which streets we could most effectively get leafletted in the allotted time with just the two of us. We decided to focus on Shrewsbury Road and Norfolk Road, also doing all of the little offshoots from them. This also included gated flats and almshouses up Fitzwalter Road.

Giving up the post

After an hour of battling through stiff gates, venturing down dark tracks, and risking dog bites, we set off back to the Showroom to debrief Clive and hand back the remaining leaflets.

A big welcome back to Monika who joined us for her second GG task in a row. We hope you become a regular member and continue to join us each week.

This week we joined Jess from Common Thread and Regather fame at Union Street along with other volunteers to help sort some clothes out for Ben's Centre; a charity that aims to provide a safe space and an open hand to those who suffer through substance misuse and its associated barriers.

You can find out more about Ben's center here.

We sorted through Common Thread donnations and put bags together of wanted items for Ben's center including warm layers and clothes that would dry well after getting wet.

9 bags in total were sorted, ready to go to Ben's center.

Until next time, happy running! :)

2 Goodgymmers joined other regular volunteers at Common Thread to help tidy everything away after the latest clothes swap. It involved lots of physical work, heaving boxes up and down stairs in the labyrinthine building. We also had the usual fun of searching through for weird and wonderful items, plus we were rewarded with delicious homemade food at the end!