A GoodGym bonanza today with Hilary, Nick and Md all joining from Newham.

It was a quick setup by Sooz, Nick and regular Mas.

Sooz led the usual announcements including a quick passing mention of her birthday and announced muffins and flapjacks for the finishers!

Sarah heading to her space at the tree, and with almost more volunteers than runners, we were off.

16 youngsters made it across the line and although there was a slight hiccup with the first place finisher having taken somewhat of a shortcut all was soon fixed and complete for another week!

On my last visit, Mr T had greeted me at the entrance to the building as the main door wasn't working, so he wanted to be sure I could get in. In the intervening period the door has been fixed, but Mr T's telling of the story behind the repair would've filled three episodes of a tv drama - suffice to say the council workmen, when they finally did arrive, knew they had to do a good job...

Again, and fortunately, the visit to the various shops along Tottenham Court Road to pick up his supplies was a little less stressful, and perhaps a bit quicker too than the door repair, which of course gave us more time to pick apart the stories of the week (and more) once I'd returned with everything he'd requested.

Top of Miss N's list this week was "brown bread"...when I asked her to explain, she directed me to (another) Turkish shop/restaurant on Church Street that bakes its own flat circular bread...and if I got to Al Madina I'd gone too far...I assured her I'd hunt down her treasure, starting with the bread, and really hoped I wouldn't miss the shop.

Little did I know that the bread really was baked on the premises, starting (obviously) with copious amounts of small hand shaped dough balls baked inside a very hot oven by one very skilful baker. A few minutes later, I had the bread, and soon after everything else on Miss N's list neatly fell into place too.

At last, after several weeks of searching (high and low), the world's politest supermarket stocked the particular brand of Gazpacho that Mrs S had been asking for - with this in the basket, I ticked everything off her list for the first time since the heatwave began (or so it seems)...she was delighted, as was I...who knew cold blended tomatoes could provoke such a euphoric reaction!