A song for this evening by our resident wordsmith Bekah

Be our guest, be our guest

Put our pickers to the test

Tie a bin bag round your hoop, cheree

& we'll provide the rest

How quickly can a group of Goodgymers respond to change......

Monday evening and our task tonight was to head over to Everton Park to plant some cowslips. Ema our wonderful area activator couldn't make the task tonight but she had set the task up - organised our meeting point, and liaised with our guest Goodgymer Caitlin to ensure she knew where we were meeting.

Our Monday meeting point for runners is at 6.30 - often runners will meet a couple miles away to run to the meeting point to get a few more miles on their trainers and tonight Ellie was meeting us at the task at 7. All sorted. Caitlin and Bekah meeting us at the meeting point Heetu Laura and Sallyann running to the meeting point picking up Caitlin and Bekah and we would run to the task and meet up with Ellie and John the task owner. All sorted...

Sadly John was unavoidably delayed and contacted Ema who then contacted Sallyann it was just after 6 - so in true Anneka Rice style (she wishes) Sallyann was running along talking with Ema on the phone - Heetu and Laura came up with ideas on how to change things around. Ema then set everything up - John was contacted and we will return to Everton another night, Ellie was contacted and diverted to pick up litter pickers and bags and gloves - 15 minutes later at 6.30 Ellie was on route to get the litter pickers and Bekah had come up with a plan of where we could litter pick.. but first we had better get the group run in.

Actually looking at the photo evidence thats not quite true....Caitlin was visiting from Islington so first we spent time chatting - we are very good at chatting. THEN we did a group run - we took Caitlin on a two cathedrals tour - we went first to the Catholic cathedral up the steps where the regular Shiverpool tour was out showing tourists around in their theatrical way. Meawhile we gave Caitlin some of our own local knowledge about the area. We then went along Hope Street and to the Anglican cathedral - a run through the graveyard as it was just getting dark - stopping for a look at Kitty Wilkinson's grave (and a short history lesson) and then on to the chalybeate spring. A run back to the suitcases meeting point and our guardian angel of the task arrived in the shape of Ellie and a bag of litter pickers and hoops.

A few weeks ago we were going to do a litter pick on Myrtle Street with Litter Clear Volunteers and due to extreme weather it had to be cancelled so thanks to Bekah off we went and litter picked in the strip of woodland on Myrtle Street - in a short space of time we had six bags and a broken metal drawer. A lady passed us and thanked us with such passion saying how she walked here every day and was so saddened by the litter.

We didnt get to plant cowlsips this week (but we will soon) but what we did was showed what could be done by a group of people who were willing to work together and open to changing plans so quickly.

Shout outs to Ema for organising remotely, Heetu for carrying lights in her back pack determinedly for what amounted to 6 miles im total ( for the planting task that didnt happen) Bekah for backmarkimg and ensuring everyone was safe when running, Laura for photography, Ellie for saving the day and picking up the litter pickers, Caitlin for being such a good sport open to change and carrying bags after a busy working day with little time for food and Sallyann for pretending to be Anneka Rice.