This was one of those nights where the plan didn’t go to plan!

More of that later, but first, a big GoodGym welcome to Luke who had joined us for the first time! We thought he made a fab addition to the team and hope he comes back next week!

Run Leader Charles was unexpectedly indisposed so Run Leader Sandy Sam quickly came to the rescue. After a very efficient introduction and a speedy round of what our favourite Christmas song was, we were off to end to the involuntary shivering! Stuart had the job of backmarker and choir master for the evening, setting off a round of singing a bit of Band Aid on the run.

Not long into the run we could only see two sets of lights in the back group rather than three and learned that we’d lost the lovely Special Kay to an injury. Oh no! After checking she was able to get home safely we were off again and soon were at the nursery which is right in the heart of the town.

The scheduled task of putting up Christmas decorations and building flat packed furniture was another change to the plan as the nursery had other jobs for us to do painting window frames, a spot of cleaning, and one of our favourites – a bit of lifting and shifting! It’s a lovely old building and we’d painted the window frames before but they need doing every few months until they can have the full restoration works later next year. Some got busy with cleaning and painting them while others cleaned one of the other rooms and another group shifted some items to clear a room.

Playsteps know us well and out came the mince pies which lasted only long enough for some boomerang video shenanigans.

After a misbehaving high-viz jacket and a bit of shuffling around, Jo managed to get the obligatory team shot for InstaFaceTwit.

Back out into the chilly dark night, and an even quicker sprint than usual through Murder Alley and we were back at the Oasis for coffee and chat.

Next up we’re off to Swindon Night Shelter to help at the Haven Day Centre before the Temporary Winter Housing Provision for the homeless opens in the New Year. There is lots to do - lifting, shifting and sorting, cleaning and tidying before the guests move in on the 2nd January. Running approximately 4km in total, this is an ideal distance for beginner runners as well as our more experienced runners. Why not give it a go?! Sign up here

This week we welcomed two newbies, Gina and and Sarah. The getting-to-know-you-question was middle names. The Vicar revealed that his name isn’t in fact Richard as his middle name is Richard, making him Richard Richard?!?! Charles refused to reveal his middle name so we’ve given him the lovely temporary one of ‘Winifred’, borrowed from another GoodGymer, until a suitable form or coercion can be found to extract the real one!

Tonight’s task felt like a marathon of TV shows and movies…..

The Walkie Taklie group, led by Sandy Sam was well subscribed. It was like a slightly muddled version of the Walking Dead where the runners were the ‘Walkers’ and the Walkie Talkies triumphed by making it in and out of ‘Murder Alley’, arriving at the task ahead of the runners and mutation free!

At the nursery, there was plenty of DIY SOS to be done. Fences needed painting – we started this task last August and we do like to complete a job! - and an insect hotel was built out of wooden pallets. There was a general sprucing up of outside spaces, and lots of our favourite ‘humping and dumping’ between the garage and the bins. We had our very own version of ‘To me….To you…’ where instead of Paul and Barry Chuckle we had Lily and Sharon moving what must be the biggest cardboard box in the west.

One of our tasks was to build a garden igloo for the kids - this was a super fun task! Although it was mind bogglingly complicated for the uninitiated to assemble a geodesic dome with about 1,000,000 parts, once it was up it was a thing of beauty! The kids are going to love it! It was just like the dome on Crystal Maze only there were no foil tokens filling the air, nor Richard O’Brien flouncing about in leopard print, but we did have midges filling the air and GoodGymers flouncing about in their red t-shirts. Photographic evidence also revealed that Kirsty, Sandy Sam and Jase the Ace had re-enacted a Star Wars lightsaber fight scene when nobody, except photographer Helen, was looking!

It all got a bit I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here when a large cardboard box descended from nowhere into the middle of the playground, filled with chocolate bars for our consumption! If we’d on been a bush tucker trial, Kiosk Kev would have no choice but to hand over the goodies after our epic efforts tonight. And why does Mike have a ‘bounty’ on his head – do we have a fugitive among us?

Just time for a quick group photo in the forest before the runners set off for a fitness session in the park in what looked like the GoodGym version of SAS Who Dares Wins. There was no head start for the Walkie Talkies as several were still doing battle with lightsabers, I mean dome poles, and some runners had some catching up to do. We were all reunited at the end though and there was some fun conversation at the post-run/walk coffee. We can’t reveal all of it but let’s just say that there are some members who have very particular sets of skills. Skills they have acquired over a very long career. Skills that make them a nightmare for people who have not Taken on board commonly accepted running etiquette. As always, names have been omitted to protect the innocent! There were lots of us tonight and after a bit more chit-chat about all things GoodGym, we were done for another week.

Next week we will be running approximately 9km in total to Prince Rupert Court in Freshbrook and back, to help with a gardening task. We have been here before and we absolutely loved the task, the place and the people! The residents were so impressed by what we did, they have asked us to go back! We will be doing another gardening task; this time to do some weeding and hedge clearing. The residents, who are 55+ years and have physical disabilities, are unable to manage the garden as it is. Our job is to make it easier for them to spend time in the garden. Sign up here!

It was unexpected; our Run Leader, Crazy Legs, was unable to make it to the run last night. There was a brief moment of panic from me, “OMG – I’ve only got 2 minutes to plan a route, an icebreaker, a fitness session? HELP!” However, this also meant that I now had the opportunity to run at the front and jump in those puddles first?! The panic faded. I love puddles and we were guaranteed some big puddles tonight considering the recent downpour? Brilliant! Surely we could act like children tonight considering we were running to Playsteps, a nursery for 0-5-year-olds near Faringdon Park?! So that’s exactly what happened, particularly on our way back to the Oasis – the biggest puddle EVER was found under the railway bridge, which no one managed to escape! Soggy trainers all round. Sorry!

I was impressed by the turn out last night considering the recent rain; 13 GG’ers including two wonderful newbies – Kirsty and Adam. Both are keen parkrunners so they get a big thumbs up from me! Something that I do know about Kirsty (now known as Kirsty H as we now have two Kirsty’s at GG Swindon) – she did brilliantly at the Swindon 10K a few weeks ago; her first EVER 10K! Fantastic! And Adam is getting married next September…to GG’er Sam! Cyprus I believe? I do love Cyprus, and weddings! I wonder if that invite is in the post already?! Only joking; how can I take a week off in September with GoodGym to organise?! Anyway, a big welcome to Kirsty and Adam was followed by an icebreaker – GG’ers had to tell the group about one of their phobias. We found out that Teresa doesn’t get invited to parties; she can’t stand balloons; Tracey has a problem with slugs (how funny that I put Tracey on ‘leaf collecting duty’ later on that evening!); Mike – moths (it’s to do with their wings apparently); and Paul struggles to open parcels if the contents are covered in polystyrene. Isn’t it great finding out a bit more about one another?!

With the other Kirsty (Kirsty W) backmarking tonight, we soon got going, taking the shortest route via the old canal path (like we did last week) splashing in as many puddles as possible. I was lucky enough to run with Graham whose head torch produces almost daylight conditions (yay – I could now detect those puddles a little easier!). Apparently, with the touch of a button it can also light up like a police siren – in blue! Really? I had to see this! So when we arrived at the nursery – Graham gave a demonstration while we waited for Kirsty W; what we couldn’t believe was that there was an actual police car in the car park?! What a coincidence!

We entered the building, keen to crack on with the task of course…but we also wanted to know why the police were outside?! We soon found out that Elroy; a super friendly PCSO had turned up a few minutes before we did, keen to find out more about GoodGym! Brilliant! So we met with Chris Edwards, Nursery Owner and followed him upstairs to the task in Hippos, the pre-school room with a high ceiling and tall windows! We were going to paint the window frames and window sills and there were five windows of varying sizes to paint in 45 minutes! Yikes! So in no time at all, GG’ers were grabbing window cleaner, paint and paint brushes to get the job done. Ashleigh did a great job of cleaning the biggest window in the room (I have no idea how she reached the top of that window?!) and Graham – the smallest window! Elroy did some great acrobatics; balancing on a book case while painting. It soon became apparent, though, that there wasn’t enough paint brushes to go around, so the Leaf Collecting Team (Sharon, Teresa and Tracey) took to the Great Outdoors instead, rather than fight over paint brushes. This was a tricky task in the dark, but with many of us now owning new ‘body torches’ thanks to a fantastic Black Friday ‘deal’ found by Paul (a bargain at £7), those leaves were soon scooped up and binned in no time at all!

Before we knew it, the time had come to clear up (Andrew was particularly good at this perhaps the constant tidying up at home with 3 boys under 5 and one-on-the-way means that Andrew never stops tidying?!); have a group photo and put on our waterproof jackets ‘just in case’ that rain made another appearance. We thanked Elroy for his company (we hope to see him and his colleagues again soon?); said goodbye to Chris and took a slightly longer route back to the Oasis via the puddles under the railway bridge. Paul had kindly offered to do a fun exercise session in Crazy Leg’s absence…in the BMX park behind the Oasis, so we all gathered in anticipation wondering what was next?! An Indian Running Drill with us pretending to be Space Invaders. Brilliant – we get to be kids yet again while getting fitter!

What a fabulous evening! Even the rain stayed away! I do hope you can join us again next week? The Scientist will be leading the group to Penhill, to deliver flyers for the Prospect Hospice. It’s a longer run, about 6km in total; a great opportunity to burn some calories before the Christmas indulgence begins!!! We need LOTS of help as we have LOTS of flyers to deliver!!! Please check it out here and sign up today. And if you can’t make it next Tuesday, why not go along to our first ever Community Mission on Saturday instead? Glynis needs some help planting some trees at the Haven; even if you can only make it for half an hour or so, please do consider going along? You know you want to?! Click here for more info!

Weather conditions were absolutely perfect for 18 Swindon GoodGymers to hit the streets and do some good.

Meeting at the Oasis, we broke the ice by introducing ourselves and answered

If we were a packet of crisps, which flavour would you be?!

With some controversial answers and old school choices, we headed off on the slightly extended route towards Playsteps Day Nursery. With myself, Lewis leading from the front and Emily from the back, we set off at a sociable pace with more and more members donning the red GoodGym colours.

Greeted by Jo Morris, Nursery Manager, in the beautiful setting of an old church building, now reformed into a daytime nursery, we were put to work on a whole host of tasks including: leaf raking, shed painting, fence painting, deconstruction of old equipment and general tidying up. Our hosts were most generous, offering us bottled water throughout and extremely grateful for the work done.

To add up a few more miles we were spoilt by the late summer’s eve weather and went over to Faringdon Park for some group running drills, a chance for GoodGymers old and new to work together on some Indian File exercises that challenged teamwork and fitness. Once we had completed these drills, we finished the loop back through some iconic Swindon sights such as the Outlet Villageand its accompanying railway history and through some of the Swindon Half Marathon Route back to the Oasis where we naturally picked up a strong finish.

Fantastic team spirit out there this week everyone, already looking forward to the next task litter picking in Broadgreen.

Big up new starters, Dan, Kirsty, Lisa, Mike and Simon; hopefully see you at another run very soon?