Wow it gets dark early these days...very much a head torch lead litter picking session this evening with the Friends of Chandos Road, where our hosts Mark and Leela were pleased to see Rebecca, Ciarán and Nick arrive ready to get picking.

The area we focused on was near the recently planted Flower Meadow, and for which (great news) the Friends of Chandos Road have secured additional funding to expand the meadow (for which they may well need some volunteer assistance to lay turf, plant seeds etc...watch this space).

With darkness now upon us, we split into smaller groups each with a bag and litter pickers and got going as best we could in all directions. A large pile of cigarette butts occupied Rebecca and her group for a long time, whilst the other group encountered the remnants of an extensive buffet and a lot of bottle lids which needed some effort to prise them out of the ground...

Before long we had three pretty full bags of rubbish, and so called it an evening - with litter pickers returned, and Rebecca kindly agreeing to take the rubbish bags to her nearest large bin on the way home, we were thanked by the team for our efforts and headed off into the darkness.

Next week we're at the Hackney Marshes Adventure Playground to help Ange with whatever she's got planned...it might involve sand, logs, bark or wheelbarrows...

I wasn't quite sure what to expect this morning when I arrived at Mr J's ready to "move some plants from pots into the ground" - as it turned out Mr J has the most amazing sun trap patio that would've blown Monty Don (other gardeners are available) away.

He needed help moving a Clematis that had made its long term home in a wooden tub into the flower bed, and which required quite a deep hole to be dug, followed by a variety of other plants moving from the bed into tubs, and finally a peony moved from another tub into the ground recently vacated by something else just moved out. The Clematis and Peony were well rooted and it required quite a bit of effort to get them uprooted...

With the right tools, a fair amount of elbow grease and Mr J's helpful instructions, I'm pretty sure I got everything moved into their rightful places, and by the end of it all, Mr J was delighted with the transformation - bring on Wednesday's rain...

A familiar list for Mr R today, with the addition of some AA batteries and the option to fish for mackerel if the sardines proved elusive. Fortunately a pair of Tesco's came to the rescue for everything on his list, and the walk between the two shops and back to his with treasure in hand was very pleasant in the afternoon sunshine.

Another perfect morning greeted us under the Big Tree today - and the blue sky, sunshine and ideal parkrunning conditions (occasional fallen leaves aside) brought out a crowd, with 61 runners completing today's 2 lapper around the fields, which included 8 absolute first timers and a whole series of PBs. Excellent work by all concerned.

Nick, as today's RD, was very glad to have the support of London Fields GG regulars Sooz and Hilary, along with Fuad, John and Louise who had answered the call to various local GG groups for more hands, and volunteers Gary, Marion, Nick, Tom and Ching-Yi, who all kindly gave up their time this morning to make it all run as smoothly as it did. Judging by the (mostly) smiles and out of breath faces as runners got their barcodes scanned having sprinted down the finishing straight, everyone did a great job.

We'll be back next week under the big tree for more of the same - can't ensure it'll be the same clear blue skies, but join us if you can - feelgood and happy smiley junior runners guaranteed.

Even before I'd got to sit down, Mr T asked me if I knew the meaning of the word Anthology - clearly it had puzzled him in this week's crossword - I did, and explained the answer, and then realised it was also a good word to describe our usual Friday afternoon chats...