Despite the recent mild weather, today brought us a grey and cool morning. Nonetheless, five keen GoodGym-ers met at the Roots4Life community hub, joining lots of their regular volunteers. For anyone who hasn't heard of it, Roots4Life is a brilliant charity set up to address the physical and mental health challenges that come with malnutrition and social isolation.

After a welcome from the task owner Cat we set about the first activity. This involved carefully digging up (poisonous) daffodils that had been planted in the raised beds alongside the garlic and potatoes. We made light work of this, and soon had all of the daffs transferred into individual pots ready to find new homes away from the vegetable patch!

After this, things went downhill (literally). At the other end of the site a trench had been started ready to plant some hedgerows. Unfortunately, as the land is under the water table, it had become rather flooded. So the first job was to drain out the worst of the water using watering cans, buckets, mugs... pretty much anything we could get our hands on really!

Once this was done, we planted the seedlings in a neat pattern, while trying to avoid sinking into the bog ourselves. Varieties included blackthorn, crab apple, dog rose, elder and wild cherry, in the hope that the hedgerow will become a foraging and cooking educational experience, as well as providing a vital habitat and food source to wildlife. There was then another bed near the community hub which also needed planting, but thankfully that was a lot less boggy, so it didn't take us long at all.

Finally, there was just time to have a quick cuppa and a slice of bread and butter pudding to bring our energy levels back up before saying our goodbyes. In total, almost 180 saplings were planted this morning so a really brilliant effort all round - well done everyone!

New runners' brief, marshalling, timekeeping, barcode scanning and token sorting were the order of the day for the three GoodGymers at Eltham junior parkrun this morning.

Alongside the other volunteers we supported the 60 young runners (and some of their parents) who completed the 2k course. Their enthusiasm and delight even brought out the sunshine for our photo.

Amidst the current cost of living crisis we may find comfort in the fact that in London, you can still find a KitKat Chunky for 60p. The greatest of all confectionary evolutions, still at 2010 prices. And this is at the vending machine of the Glyndon Centre in Woolwich. But coins only - tragedy!

We began by convincing Jen not to make us warm up in the rain, but under the Crossrail overhang. In honour of the multi-genre, multi-Oscar winning Everything Everywhere, All At Once, we asked If you were a film genre, what would you be? Your affectionate author admitted to being a rom-com (Tom-com? Thought of that joke 24 hrs too late) as 1998 masterpiece You’ve Got Mail is my Mastermind specialist subject. Cue plenty of questions, all answered correctly, may I add. will not be defeated.

A big welcome to Bobby joining us tonight and hope we see you again! We warmed up, set off and passed a restaurant that Matt was dining at later which garnered differing reviews from within GoodGym faithful - we are yet to hear of his experience.

Upon arrival, we found that host Andy wasn’t expecting us and was probably about to tuck into his tea at home. We chatted whilst we waited, some of us browsing the 50 best room coms according to Vanity Fair. You’ve Got Mail was number 2, and the sickly saccharine atrocity that is Love Actually nowhere to be seen. That journalist knows their onions. Speaking of food, it is here we discovered the KitKat offer, and here where the puns can begin. A bit of quick thinking meant we found a bunch of cabinets Nestle-d in the corner of a room, and duly dismantled them and threw them out. Offered a cup of tea but we were very much sweet enough. The short task was a spoonful of sugar for some, I’m sure, but a pill needing sugaring for others, so we went for some hill sprints nearby. Sugar loaf Mountain it was not, but certainly a sweet spot between flat slope and steep climb. Four laps and that was enough to burn off any sugar rush. I should cocoa.

Back at base, it was a warm down, and farewell. Until next time…