It's been at least two months since my last GROAD session at St. Faith's, so I was not in tune with the latest arrangements. Yet, not much has changed in terms of format and layout of the room with only a few things swapping.

The GROAD volunteers and I managed to set up the room within the two hours. I took on the responsibility of putting out the toys on the outside table before coming inside to help with the clothes that still needed to be hanged. After all, the hangers had been taken, we proceeded to fold the clothes to display them.

As it reached 16:00, we called it a day. Some stayed to tidy up and organise the room as it's the last session of the summer period (six to seven weeks off).

After delaying this summer rounders social by two weeks due to the Euros, Sam finally got the gang together to play some rounders.

Sam and Maria hauled over the rounders kit and gazebo from their home and set up shop on the rugby pitch in Peckham Rye park. Thankfully, it was a cooler and cloudier day than the previous day, but it was still quite muggy and humid.

Dylan, Leanne and Isaac all came on time as we waited for the rest to come. By 16:45, we had everyone, but we realised only one person came from the North side of the river to represent... Lobo cycled 40 minutes from Wapping to be here. So, naturally, we had to change tactic and we divided the teams per originally from "North of London upwards" against the South:

Ninety Nine Problems, but a Northerner ain't one consisted of Lobo, Daryl, Isaac, Jess, Leanne, Adrian and Tarik (Adrian and Andrada's friend). They were against Southern Softies: Dylan, James, Eileen, Rebecca, Andrada, Natalia (Adrian and Andrada's other friend) and Maria.

It was no contest as even over 2 innings each, Ninety Nine Problems, but a Northerner ain't one scored 12 and a half rounders against 1 and a half rounders. The game was over within 30 minutes, which prompted a new layout to rounders field as the final base was too close to the backstop. Still, Ninety Nine Problems, but a Northerner ain't one thoroughly deserved the win and leads 2-1 in the yearly series.

Yet, the best was still to come... Sam felt left out and wanted to get a game in. Sam thought the numbers would be uneven, but Leanne left early, which meant we had the numbers per each team.

Splitting the teams was hard, but it ended up being GG Southwark members without Sam against Sam and the rest. "Southwark sacrificing Sam" vs. "Sam outside Southwark" - SSS vs. SOS...

The game was such a close contest with SSS putting up a big score of 10 and a half rounders to beat after two innings when SOS had only scored 4 rounders in the first innings. Yet, with a big team effort and massive runs from Lobo and Dylan, SOS managed to force a super inning as they came back to draw.

However, it was in the super innings that SSS was too strong and in one innings only, they scored 11 and a half rounders after five rounders from Isaac alone and Daryl had a couple too. Even with SOS trying their luck, they only managed 7 rounders before SSS managed to get the whole team out with a great catch from Maria to get big-scoring Lobo out!

All in all, it was such a fun afternoon with loads of us learning rounders for the first time or for the first time in many many years! Looking forward to putting on another social rounders session next summer, so look out for the listing come early 2025!

As Sam opened up Old Spike Peckham, he was met by Richard who came for his first ever GoodGym experience as he wanted to get more involved with his local community on the days that would allow him. With his son, who practices karate on Wednesday nights, but had a week-off, Richard made sure he could be present and get his document checked for the DBS checks.

With Alex coming back from a weekend road trip to Berlin (to support England) and Emma getting ready for her trip to India in a months' time, we all contemplated on the lack of a summer in London. Yet, the night belonged to David, who on Saturday reached his 50th good deed, but we celebrated his milestone with the traditional black cape, ballon and party hat! Congrats David on reaching this first major milestone!

Sam got going with his usual speech and his ice-breaker tonight was about World Emoji Day as well as World Snake Day (which was the day before). The snap poll showed that half of us are afraid of snakes, but he also asked that: "What emoji would you be?"

🤗😬☺️🫶🤝

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Hampton Court edible garden

The eight of us headed out for a quick warm-up in the humid weather before dashing off to make it to Dawson's Heights in time. With Sam leading from the front and Maria back marking, we took it in our strides to make it to the top of the Overhill Road to meet Ellie and a few Dawson's Heights residents including a few of the young ones.

Ellie told us that they had a whole edible garden donated to them from the Hampton Court Flower Show. Although, the garden was beautifully re-planted, it still needed to be mulched, watered and have a woodchip path going through the middle.

Emma teamed up with Paulin to collect, wheelbarrow and dump the woodchip whilst Alex, David, Nelly and Richard collected bags of mulch to spread around the new garden and the existing garden beds. They all had a few little helpers as the young kids of the estate wanted to get involved where they could. Maria took on the last remaining job of watering all the plants, but needed to get the hose from the garage.

Despite the simple tasks we had, we still needed the full 40 minutes to finish off all three tasks. By the end of it, we had a thick woodchip path, all plants mulch and absorbing all the nutrients and minerals from it after being watered.

We said our goodbyes knowing that the next time we come back would be our last session in 2024. Emma and Richard dashed home from Dawson's Heights whilst the rest of us enjoyed the downhill run back to Old Spike Peckham.

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Thank You to all the GG-ers

A personal thanks from me to all those who came out last night. It was our penultimate session at Dawson's Heights allotment after going there for four sessions prior. We have been a massive help in getting the allotment setup. Let's finish it off with a bang on the 7th of August. Kudos to all and if I don't see you next week, see you soon!