The late October Sunday morning felt nice and dry compared to Saturday's soggy night. The clocks' change caught both Kash and the task owner, Elisabeth off guard, yet they showed up at the right time for the litterpick at Acton Gardens. So did Bet.

It was Bet's first session with the Acton Litter Collective. She found out that one of the LAGER Can volunteers helping keep Acton Gardens clean lived at the same street as her. It's a small world!

There were two choices of litterpicking locations for the GoodGymers today. Bet opted out for the little park she was fond of, the one behind Sainsbury's, Kash chose the East side of Bollo Bridge Road where she found a wealth of cans and bottles hiding in the bushes. Elisabeth gave the volunteers transparent bags for the recycling, so they could separate them from the general waste.

Nearly halfway through the task, the heavens opened and a downpour started. It was quite intense and some of the GoodGymers sought shelter under the trees to wait till the worst of the rain clouds would pass. The rain didn't stop the determined litter warriors though and Acton Gardens emerged from the rain much more free of soggy litter.

It was a holy satisfying task last night as we headed to a new task location - the Comboni centre for spirituality.

On the plus side, it was brilliant to finally be able to celebrate Florian reaching that first magic milestone -50 good deeds! A huge well done Florian, well done for all that Wednesday night hard graft and weekends spent planting, litter picking and helping out at parkrun. You're a GG hero!

On the less positive side, the rain that had been pelting down all afternoon was showing no signs of stopping, and it was set to be a very damp task. We united as a group at the centre, which is run by the Comboni order of nuns. It is a sacred quiet space in Chiswick which is open to all to experience prayer and to put love into action by reaching out to the poor and needy. We were met by the brilliant Sister Natalia, who greeted us with a very apt quote from their patron saint - ""Night and day, sun and rain, will find me equally and always ready to help in your spiritual needs".

Sister Natalia led us around the peaceful garden to let us know exactly what had to be done. There were plenty of weeds, but we were under strict instructions not to touch the rhubarb, as the Sisters enjoy it with custard.

The team got stuck in to all the various patches, soon filling up bag after bag of weeds. Meanwhile, I was hearing all about Sister Natalia's stints around the world in places like South Sudan, the DRC and Uganda, where she slept on the jungle floor and experienced civil war - pointing out that after all that she was not going to be put off by the increasingly heavy rain! She also invited all GGers to come to her special service on Sunday where she will celebrate 50 years in the order.

After a good session in the garden the rain was getting worse, so we decided to call it a night and head to the pub to celebrate Florian's 50th good deed with an absolutely amazing cake!

Yesterday was National Fitness Day, and what better way to celebrate than a run to a labour intensive task at a local space? Unfortunately for us our weekly post task fitness session had to be postponed due to the non-stop rain - but don't worry, we'll make up for it next week!

It was our regular session at Chiswick House last night and we were back at the café area to help de-thistle and clear the ground. On the plus side the rain had softened the soil, making it really easy to pull out the unwanted interlopers amongst the beautiful tall grasses.

On the less than positive side, the rain was getting harder by the minute. After a good stint of hard work we all decided to take shelter at the café, taunted by the menu of hot sourdough pizza, to wait for the deluge to let up. All of us that is except for Michelle, who bravely fought on in the midst of the grasses despite the downpour!

We decided on ten more minutes of hard graft before calling it a night and heading towards the comfort of hot tea, baths and pubs! Well done for making it out team, your commitment to community in the face of unpleasant circumstances is to be highly commended!

We heard rumours of impending hot weather from head gardener Chris, so fingers crossed next week will be a lot more pleasant for our litter picking session with Cultivate. We'll also be seeing how our times compare with last week's fitness challenge, so start limbering up!

Was it the sunshine, was it the lovely task at Chiswick House and Garden or was it the promise of the three minute plank challenge? Whatever the motivation, it was wonderful to see a group of 18 of us at the group run last night, including some lovely GG tourism from Hammersmith and Ealing.

We kicked off the night with a warm up, enjoying feeling the sun on our faces rather then the rain on our backs like the past few weeks. Our job for evening was just round the corner, so we set off at a fair old lick for the community kitchen garden. Somehow our group managed to get separated over the five minute run, but we happily soon spotted the group of red tshirts running to join us from the opposite direction than we had expected!

We were met by task owner Stephen who was enjoying the golden hour light over the spectacular kitchen garden, and he put us to work. While Steph, Madhan, Emily and Luis went off into the depth of the estate to collect burdock, nettles and thistles, the rest of the crew got stuck in to shifting compost for the central raised beds. This was accompanied by the melodious sound of some very squeaky barrows which ensured we knew where everybody was at all times!

The pile soon went down, and the flower beds were treated to a covering of nutrient rich soil. Apparently this means that as well as helping growth, the gardeners have to water less, which is good news all round! It's wonderful to come regularly to the garden , as we can enjoy seeing the way it transforms over the course of the year and the benefits of our work too!

Job done, we headed off for the orangery, where a few of us learned that a couple of very famous Beatles music videos - Rain and Paperback Writer - had been shot. Luckily last night there was no Rain for us, so the write thing to do was some tough fitness challenges. We started with the three minute plank. This sounds really tough, but we kept switching up the moves so that we were constantly using different muscles. It's a great idea for runners to work on their core as it improves running efficiency and reduces the risk of injury. If that wasn't enough we also smashed out a minute's incremental squat. Great work everyone!

Next week we're back by the shoreline, hope to see you there!