Despite the much improved lighting situation, we still met just inside the door, with Bianca wearing three layers and two pairs of socks!

We set off after a hyped up run briefing from leading light Laurie where no one seemed to have any energy. Beatboxing on the way we met leading light leaflet legend Fay who had prepared a great haul including a youth disco which got Joe reminiscing. We split off into two groups and got to work. Doug raised the union flag with Brexit pride and Sallyann even managed to find a brand new beatbox!

We delivered all the leaflets, and even the extra ones that Chris seemed to find, and headed back to base. Angela swung off early to prepare for bicycle shopping and Andy couldn't be bothered to do the last beatbox. For shame! If we miss out by 20 points we know who to blame.

It is also the quiz this weekend on Sunday, and if anyone wants a lift to Barrow farm on Sunday morning for the task there do let me know.

Make sure you read the email from Laurie (cough Martin cough) about the run next week. We will be setting off from Lidl to the foodbank. It is a longer run and there is a list of stuff they need to bring. We may also head to the pub after. Beat the street ends next week during the run so we can all celebrate! Especially if we can catch the girl guides!

There I was going about my usual Sunday business when all of a sudden I got a phone call - due to the expected cold temperatures (and maybe snow!) tonight, the Essex Highways staff helping collect the trees for Farleigh Hospice couldn't make it!

Being the hero I am, I stepped up. Andy grabbed a van from his mate and we were ready to rock and roll. We drove around Boreham grabbing trees, with a midway break to empty the van and for snacks and coffee.

3 houses hadn't left their trees out and one house wasn't actually in Boreham but we got the rest. We dropped them back at the farm to be chipped up. The large pile in the background you can see is about 3000 trees! Amazing work everyone who has collected trees, raising an estimated £50,000 for the charity's wonderful work.

We were profusely thanked for stepping in at the last minute and they told Andy 'make sure you thank your son too'. I don't know whether to be offended or not...

One thing to note is Andy is very sweary when driving a white van.

After being dazzled by Andy's festive t-shirt and Russell's festive Lidl hat, we did a squat-free warm up (especially for Martin) and made our way to Meadgate.

We found Fay and Sallyann waiting with the Grinch on the corner of Meadgate, and made a start on leafletting. Whilst leafletting, we found out that it was Russell's 50th good deed, and that he recently got engaged, so double congratulations to Russell, and a black tshirt will be in the post soon.

Everyone was so dazzled by the various Christmas lights on houses that we got separated into two groups for most of the run, only meeting back up at the end for our farewells! David's photo to the group unsurprisingly didn't help the other group to locate us.

Tonight was Martin's 25th good deed, and Jess's 8th, so we're hoping to see a couple more 50th's next year from at least these two new members!

Great effort everyone for our last good deed of 2023, with 8.5-ish km for the runners, and a huge amount of leaflets delivered for Farleigh, The Art Place, and the YMCA.

Thanks everyone for a great year, and we look forward to seeing you all in 2024. We've got the January challenge coming up, so please remember to make sure your Strava is linked to your GoodGym account.

See you all soon

Laurie

Six GoodGymers got up at the crack of dawn to help set up the annual Farleigh Santa Fun Run. We met Selina who put us to work helping unload the van, before we set off round the course putting out flags and signage to make sure the Santas didn't get lost. By the time we got back to the event village there were Santas everywhere!

Rich left us to go back to his sick bed and Andy went off to transform into Saint Nick to take part in the race. The rest of us treated ourselves to breakfast as a reward for our hard work. We bumped into Joel and Abbi en route who joined us for something to eat. While we were there we did some research ready for the quiz this evening.

Our next group run will be another lot of leaf clearing at St John's Hall, hope to see you there.

With headtorches and jackets on for a chilly evening outdoors, we wasted little time in setting off to our task. We jogged to meet Fay and Sallyann with our leaflets, found Angela, and set off around Springfield with our leaflets for CHESS, Farleigh Hospice, and Woodcroft Nursery School.

As usual, the chatting was non-stop with Andy and Rich, and Rich trying to drag Erin in at every possible opportunity. I enjoyed catching up with Martin about his parkrun-extravaganza holiday, and Jenny about her tortoise's non-hibernation. I also enjoyed having both Ken and Fay with me, encouraging the more forceful style of my run leadership in shouting at everyone to jog and leaflet more, and walk and talk less.

More and more leaflets kept appearing, so we kept going, and in the end covered just under 7km! Those who jogged back rewarded themselves by inhaling one, or two, or three cakes each, all courtesy of our generous starting location host, ARU. Thanks to Joe for his excellent photography again, this time of cake inhaling in action.

Saturday 28th October activities

Just in case you missed it, on Saturday it's Chelmsford's 500th parkrun, followed by breakfast, and later followed by our pub crawl from 2pm (see details here).

For parkrun, we'll get a group photo before the run, so please get there by around 8.45 if you can!

For the pub crawl, please sign up if you are coming. If you want to join later, send a message on whatsapp and we'll let you know where we are.

See you all on Saturday!

Laurie

On a glorious Wednesday summer evening we gathered at the HQ for another great group run and task.

Firstly, I'd like to welcome Angela to the group for her first run with us. Hope you enjoyed yourself and our chatty little group.

Tonights task was to deliver leaflets for 6 different charities that Fay had taken time during the week to fold (400 of them) together to make an easy bundle to post. As always, Thank you Fay.

Before we set off Martin produced a bag full of courgettes that he had spare and needed to find a good home for. And Leanne also had some rhubarb that she wanted to share with the group. Deciding that running with these wouldn't be wise we left them in Leanne's car and set off to meet Fay and Sallyann.

We met them just outside Springfield Baptist Church with bags full of leaflets and distributed them to all and set-off down Sandford road. Splitting into 2 groups we managed to not lose each other and even not to miss a letterbox.

Carrying on until almost all the leaflets were delivered we headed back to HQ and retrieved the rhubarb and courgettes and distributed them to those who wanted them.

As always thanks for coming guys, literally couldn't have done it without you.

Next week we will be going to the visitors center at Chelmsford prison to paint their outdoor area. ( there will also be a social after the run with some non alcoholic beer if you want to stay on)

Run Happy

Rich