Three of us met at the gym. Three grown men. Zero sense of direction. Off we jaunted, weaving in and out of housing estates, Martin regaling us with tales of his jeffing, Richard with tales of his son's projectile vomiting, and me with tales of world class half-marathon running.

We arrived to greet the other three angels to get to scrubbing. Sallyann helped clean the cooker hood, or would if she could have reached, Jess is training to be a celebrant so she can officiate Goodgym socials, and Leanne is training to be a personal trainer because merely being a martial arts instructor she is worried she might not be able to completely kick my ass.

We polished off the cleaning (get it?) with the shiniest unit you have ever seen, blinding the Von Trapp family.

We set off to run back, thankfully Leanne showed us the way to go so it was slightly less of a distance back. Great work everyone - and remember, Moto pizza this Sunday at 9!

We met just inside the doors of the gym and it would appear i forgot how to use them. After blindly slapping at the exit door I eventually made it in to get the pickers and bags.

Three of us set off for a run, and two for a walk. It was very chilly and windy but we were warmed by talk of Ben bringing brownies to a run in the future - his baking showstopper. He's also looking forward to Nigella on bakeoff, as am I, purely for baking reasons of course. Hearing about Martin's 5 marathons in 5 days this easter(!!), we hit a deep deep unpassable patch of water which held us up.

We met up with the two litter picker carriers and headed further down the bunny walks in search of litter. Andy was complaining he is still snowed under opening all his Valentine's gifts and cards, while Sallyann was more upset she hadn't realised today was Global Drink Wine Day!

We picked two bags of litter and two of us (me and Ben) lost fingers to frostbite. We posed for a quick photo as it seems I wanted to show off my thumb...

Anyway, good work for the four of you to brave the weather and hopefully one day people stop littering.

We applauded Richard P for his 250th parkrun volunteer, incredible work to tie with his 80th good deed.

Onward ho to the pub to do the leaflets and meet the four who walked there tonight. We voted and decided that less than 2k there would be preferred. Naturally Joel totally ignored us and we did 3.4km on the way there! Martin was in charge of conversation topics and chose the Chelmsford area activator role!

The pub team had laid out the leaflets ready (waiting for Andy and his City Sounds) with such intensity that Leanne had sliced her finger open.

Wine in hand, Sallyann revealed she had only woken up at 10:30 this morning, what a life of luxury! Asking Fay how Paisley was i was informed she currently 'smells like a tart's boudoir'. Lovely. As we were leaving we spied an advert for Caribbean roast dinners, now that is intriguing.

Next week is delivering all the leaflets we folded today and the vague plan is Chelmer Village way. CHESS, Age concern, City Sounds, Hearing Help Essex, Colchester Zoo Stampede, and Beaulieu Community Centre. See you there!

What a day out.

Our first volunteer at Junior Parkrun, a warm welcome by Paul leading to a world class whistle test, followed by the Parkrun!

We all had different roles, from barcode scanning, to marshalling, to funnel management, to tokens, and more, but everyone whooped and hollered the kids along. They were very quick!

The main shoutout has to go to Richard Perry, who did his sensational 250th Parkrun volunteer! And contrary to popular belief, the good deed this time wasn't bringing cake to the run. But the cake was very welcomed.

Afterwards we went to Wetherspoons and I am shocked to my core that the £1.50 haggis I had did not make me feel good for the rest of the day.

Great volunteering everyone, nice to do it at Junior Parkrun too to mix it up. We've been asked if we will help out at Writtle Parkrun too!

7 of us met at Sanctus ready to help wrap some Christmas presents and make up some gift boxes.

Andy and I ran an epic marathon-esque distance from HQ ( around 1km), while Fay and Sallyann walked, and we met Ben, Martin and Leah there as they have just come straight from work.

Claire was there to greet us and set us up and get our production line going. And may i say what a well oiled machine we became with some wrapping, some on box production and some box stuffing. She was even kind enough to make us teas and coffees to keep us hydrated caffeinated.

As we were deeply engrossed in our task (and top chatting) some lovely people arrived with some food donations and on seeing us doing such a good job they realised they had extra minced pies and kindly offered them to us. We politely declined (but not too much) and after a few more offerings we accepted and gobbled them all up with coffee and tea. mmmmmmm minced pies.

With everything wrapped and packed, we cleaned any crumbs off the table, stacked the chairs back and went on our merry ways.

Thanks for coming guys, what would have taken one person all day, just took us 45 mins and great chatting to boot.

Next week we will be clearing leaves at St John's Church Hall

thanks again all

Run Happy

Rich