A small but mighty group of runners met at Shoreditch High Street for the first of our borough‑wide leafleting routes to expand our reach to more community organisations.

We ambled across East London, stopping at a predetermined list of community organisations and food gardens along the way, dropping flyers and exploring parts of Tower Hamlets we didn’t even know existed.

Conditions were ideal: blue skies, a steady pace, and an impressive number of cats and dogs spotted en route. We made the most of the sunshine with a brief wander through Columbia Road Market, refuelling with coffees and matcha along the way.

Where we couldn’t find anywhere suitable to drop leaflets, Lucinda dutifully noted down contact emails for follow‑up. And while we weren’t sure whether this new initiative would pay off, by the end of the session we already had two referrals!

With five more routes still to leaflet, there’s plenty of opportunity to spread the word about GoodGym, drum up even more interest, and continue discovering new corners of Tower Hamlets along the way.

Second time lucky at Ms C’s – I was pleased to hear that her power had been quickly restored after last weekend’s outage, which had rather abruptly cut short my previous visit before any actual cutting could begin.

This time, everything was fully powered up and ready to go. With her flymo back in action, I got stuck in and gave the garden a short back and sides, along with a bit of weeding to tidy things up.

An hour later, the job was done without any further interruptions, and I headed off home.

Ms C was very grateful for the support—definitely a cut above last weekend’s attempt.

Today's mission for the always friendly and chatty Mr J was the follow up to task 1 of couple of weeks ago, where I was determined to build the flat pack desk today, having run out of time (and space) last time round.

Fortunately there was sufficient floor space in front of Mr J's TV today, and the instructions were clear with no parts missing, so was just a question of following the pages and it would hopefully come together as expected - in the meantime Mr J and I discussed at great length a wide variety of topics - he from the comfort of his chair, me from various positions either under, beside or above the partially completed desk...

With the desk complete, and moved to where he wanted it, Mr J asked if I'd mind framing his final Wall of Fame guitarist picture, which I was more than happy to do - again the image required a quick trim before fitting into the frame, and once it was done, we left Mr Beck propped up ready for hanging on the wall in due course. Mr J has a few more pictures ready to be framed, so I sense another visit will be on the cards to get those done!

A large group of Goodgymers and a professional photographer met at the Tower Hamlets Cemetery Park on Monday evening. Our task was to help Ken remove Goosegrass from an area of the cemetery. This annual plant is a fast-growing weed that can strangle other plants and prevent important species from growing. We set about in a methodical way to tackle this sticky plant, moving along in a line from one small area to the next. We pulled and raked out masses of it, braving nettles and graves in the process.

We definitely enjoyed the extra daylight, watching the sky change colour above our heads. It was a fun and social task (as always!) and it was good to see how much goosegrass we cleared and know this will make a big difference to the health of the plants and park this summer.

Huge welcome to first time Goodgymers Chloe and Jack P and also to Jack F for his first group task! It was great to have you all and hope to see you again soon. Also shout out to Kareem who celebrated his birthday with us in the Cemetery Park!

I popped in to help Ms C with her garden on my way home from junior parkrun. Unfortunately, a power cut meant the lawnmower was out of action, so the task couldn’t go ahead this time.

It was still really nice to meet her and have a good chat — definitely not a wasted visit!

Fingers crossed for a more powerful session next time! 💪🌱

Mr B was very happy with the end result. I really enjoyed working in his garden again and finishing the job I started a month ago. We had a lovely chat, and it was a great workout too